This seems a bit off...

[Balog]

http://www.laleva.org/eng/2012/03/world_renown_heart_surgeon_speaks_out_on_what_really_causes_heart_disease.html#.T2vngYAJphz.facebook


I'm always open to believing the conventional wisdom is wrong, but this rather poorly written article sends up some flags. Any doctor types on APS who could give some insight?

[BobR]

Well, I am not too sure. Maybe after years of study involving hundreds if not thousands of people it might be true. But what we are doing now is evidence-based practice. It may not be the best way to do things but it is what we have.

I also believe most high cholesterol, along with out of whack triglycerides and lously HL and LDL levels come from genetics. I could probably drink nothing but H2O and my levels would still be jacked up. My mother had her first heart attack at 52 and her third and final @ 57. 3 kids, all have issues with cholesterol.

I think we all know that a high fat diet is bad for us, just as the package of "stuff" you can buy marketed as food that has an expiration date down the road a few years.

IMO, until he publishes some peer-reviewed studies and can point to some evidence based practice, he is just another retired doc trying to make some money selling a book.

bob

[RoadKingLarry]

http://www.webmd.com/diet/features/diet-review-the-caveman-paleo-diet

I had a nice long post going but my gorram iPhone ate it.

I'm not in lockstep with a paleo diet as I include grains legumes and dairy(and bacon).

I began a concerted move away from highly processed food a few years ago. I raise a significant part of what we eat. For the most part it's less expensive, tastes better, more nutritious and I know where it's been.
Losing 70#s of body weight since I started and feeling better is proof enough for me that I'm on the right path.

[230RN]

I always wonder about medical/health fads.  One decade it's don't eat this, the next one is yes eat this. 

Obviously, it's our physiologies that change from decade to decade and the medical industry exerts great effort to follow those changes.

Like administering lead compounds used to be beneficial, as was bleeding with leeches or vacuum cups.  But our physiology has changed, and these two methods no longer suit the changes in our metabolisms.

The only health advice I suggest following is Michelle Obama's.

 

[seeker_two]

Well....we all learned about the dangers of alcoholism from the short life of Ted Kennedy....

[brimic]

I also believe most high cholesterol, along with out of whack triglycerides and lously HL and LDL levels come from genetics.

I agree.
Its been well known for a long time that mutations to certain surface proteins on our cells cause the cells to not uptake and process cholesterols correctly.
Irritation has also been well known for a long time ofr build up of tissues in the irritated area, whther it be calcifications/bone spurs in parts of the body that get a lot of wear and tear, or hardening of arteries.

Its also known that chelation therapy that is used to reduce heavy metals after exposure, strips the arteries clean of plaques as a side effect.

Problem is that chelation therapy  is cheap, while a lifetime of cholesterol drugs is very expensive.

The doctor who discovered that stomach ulcers were caused by bacteria and could be treated with a cheap round of antibiotics faced the same uphill battle and scorn for his challenge of conventional wisdom and all of the money involved .

[brimic]

Our food that we eat is contaminated with gunk and garbage.
How many items in your household have 'high fructose corn syrup' or any form of soy in it? The former is pure poison, the latter is debateable.
It seems like we have to justify our surplus crops and surplus agricultural industry by putting this stuff in just about everything on the grocery store shelf.

I notice that the article mentioned Kinase reactions caused by consuming these products- kinase reactions are often seen in auto-immune diseases that attack the joints. I wonder how many people are out there suffering from 'incurable' painful diseases without the knowledge that they are simply poisoning themselves?

I like to jump all over this stuff because I had some sort of auto-immune (reactive arthritis) problems that the doctors couldn't figure out last year. I made a lot of lifestyle changes, much of it havingto do with what I'll consume or not consume, and the problems went away.

[MicroBalrog]

http://www.quackwatch.org/11Ind/lundell.html

Dwight C. Lundell, M.D. lost medical license in 2008.

[Chuck Dye]

Just the page header screams quackery.

Get a grip on your wallet, this guy has something to sell.

[Bob F.]

Pretty much w/ Bob R. on this one.

Wasn't it Ben Franlin who said (among other things) "All things in moderation"?

When I ran a Cardiac Rehab program, I told my patients to "eat like you have some damned sense"!

I also told them, "If you're not going to quit tobacco, totally, go down to the pawn shop and buy a cheap gun."

[MillCreek]

What the two Bobs said.  Some of his statements as to chronic inflammation are probably correct, and more and more evidence is coming out on the role of chronic inflammation in many acute and chronic diseases.  It being primarily caused by food and counteracted by supplements is quite a bit more speculative, without a lot of good evidence to back it up.  Speaking as someone who has worked in medmal for almost 30 years now, I learned long ago that just because someone has MD, DO, RN or whatever behind their name does not necessarily make them an expert.  Especially in areas outside their usual scope of practice.

[grampster]

When swmbo and I get back home, we're gonna break out the Sugarbusters book and get serious about watching what we eat. 

[MillCreek]

http://blog.seattlepi.com/hottopics/2012/03/26/chemists-popcorn%E2%80%99s-antioxidants-top-fruits-veggies/

Clearly Dr. Lundell doesn't want you to know about the life-saving properties of popcorn.  No money to be made selling popcorn.

[lee n. field]

http://blog.seattlepi.com/hottopics/2012/03/26/chemists-popcorn%E2%80%99s-antioxidants-top-fruits-veggies/

Clearly Dr. Lundell doesn't want you to know about the life-saving properties of popcorn.  No money to be made selling popcorn.

Tell that to the heirs of Orville Redenbacher.

[MrsSmith]

You know what causes heart disease?

Going to the doctor. No one has ever died of heart disease who didn't go to the doctor to be diagnosed with it.

 

[Chuck Dye]

Wasn't it Ben Franlin who said (among other things) "All things in moderation"?

"Moderation in all things, including moderation" is attributed to Petronius, Mark Twain, Oscar Wilde, and others.  I like it better.

[seeker_two]

You know what causes heart disease?

Going to the doctor. No one has ever died of heart disease who didn't go to the doctor to be diagnosed with it.

 

Yep....and if women would stop going to obstetricians, we'd stop a lot of guys getting the surprise of their lives, too......

[MrsSmith]

Oh yeah, that makes SO MUCH sense Seeker! 

[MechAg94]

I tend to follow the "moderation" theime though in practice it is more like glutony. 

I recall asking a nurse about dietary recommendations after getting my cholesterol checked and she was actually horrified that I intended to eat red meat for lunch.  The diet recommendation was basically vegetarian.  I didn't go back to that doctor. 

[MillCreek]

The sticky wicket is for those of us who have a genetic issue that causes increased cholesterol.  I have a mutation in the ApoB100 gene and I could eat nothing but heart healthy and would still have somewhat high (220) cholesterol.  I know this for a fact because when my high cholesterol was first spotted at age 30, I ate an AHA Step 2 diet for six months straight to see if that would help.  It did not. Fish oil did not.  Only by taking prescription statins or using niacin is my cholesterol lowered to acceptable levels. 

[lee n. field]

Only by taking prescription statins or using niacin is my cholesterol lowered to acceptable levels. 

Statins and me do not get along.

[MillCreek]

Statins and me do not get along.

Boy, you should have seen me back when I was taking niacin.  I had to take it twice a day, 1000 mg.  About ten minutes after taking it, as it dissolved, I would flush all over my entire body, I would turn beet red from nose to tail, start sweating and I would itch all over.  This lasted for about ten minutes, typically.  I did this for five years, and would have to have liver function tests twice a year to make sure that it was not damaging my liver.  Fortunately, 40 mg. simvastatin does the job with no side effects.  I don't miss the niacin one bit.

[BobR]

For those who the statins help, and who can tolerate them they are a good drug. I have been through all of them. I am one of the very few people who has increased tinnitus from the statins. My tinnitus ratcheted up so badly I thought other people must surely hear the ringing. It was to the point I was having trouble sleeping. I thought I had found the answer when we hit the 4th statin, then I started having nightly dreams, very vivid dreams, the type that wake you up wondering what the hell just happened.

So now, I continue to do the old standby, gemfibrozil and have recently added zetia to it, watch my diet, (not sure that really matters in my case), and try to exercise at least 20 minutes daily. I believe it is inevitable I will have a heart attack, I am just trying to put it off as long as I can.

bob

[brimic]

It did not. Fish oil did not.  Only by taking prescription statins or using niacin is my cholesterol lowered to acceptable levels. 

Niacin and me don't get along.
Doc gave me some of that stuff for lowering triglycerides, I took it for two days and felt like hot bugs were crawling under the skin of my face.

[230RN]

Isn't niacin related to nicotine?  "Somebody" used to recommend it as part of an anti-smoking regime as a temporary substitute.

"Some other body" said it is a good biting insect repellent.  Makes your blood taste bad or something.

(Just off the top of my head from recollections deep down inside my wrinkled old cortex, and just to bring up the subject.)

Coffee-deprived Terry, 230RN