I want to thank for your work. I am a big fan of the site. As a Nephrologist, unfortunately, not only do I see many patients under going a cardiac cath but they may also receive "drive by" angiograms of the renal arteries with stenting. A recent study in the Annals of Interal Medicine, July 16, 2009 showed no difference in medical management and stenting of the renal arteries. Moreover, 2 patients in the stenting arm of the study died within 30 days of stenting. From a Renal prospective, there are complications of renal angiograms and stenting which are aneurysms, bleeding, infections and the possibility of worsening kidney failure which can be permanent. I fear that more patients are under going this procedure than necessary. I will be commenting more about this study in my blog:
www.nephropal.blogspot.com.

Thank you for your hard work.

Kenneth Tourgeman, MD

Dr. Davis-

What are your recommendations for females under 30?  I was told that I am not eligible for a heart scan due to my age, but I have a strong family Hx of CVD (father had bypass at age 50).

rom a Renal prospective, there are complications of renal angiograms and stenting which are aneurysms, bleeding, infections and the possibility of worsening kidney failure which can be permanent. I fear that more patients are under going this procedure than necessary.

If you're going to base your diet on the bible, then you shouldn't be eating pork (Leviticus 11:7), and you should eat plenty of locusts and crickets (Leviticus 11:22)

Oooh, wait'll the God-deniers get a load of this one.

Actually, I've wondered about the proper interpretation of passages like those mentioned, and this post is helpful for me.

I appreciate this & putting the verses into context - but was human excrement to be used as content in the bread, or the fuel source to bake it?

I'm pretty sure the dung was not to go into the bread, it was to be used as fuel for the fire over which the bread was baked. But your point still holds very well. They also omit the lying on your side for 390 days. If eating Ezekiel bread is so healthy, so must be lying on your side for over a year.

I prefer to "kill the fattened calf."

LOL

Dung was probably not an ingredient, but the fuel used to cook the bread.  (Still pretty unsavory, though.)

1) All religion is poetry...

-- Paul Tillich

2) I have a huntch that, uh, folks from a couple thousand years ago, uh, never heard of macronutrients, glucose, insulin, etc.

3) Peace

For those who are interested in the Bible's statements on food, here's a link to a brief overview of kosher laws:

http://www.kashrut.com/articles/soul_food/

Combining a lesson in both religion and medicine, Love It!!

I agree with you, Dr. Davis, that religious issues are very important to many people concerned about dieting. And it is important to discuss them, even though some people think that religious issues should not be part of any discussion related to diet.

In fact, a lot of people who think  about diet issues from a scientific standpoint tend to think that religiosity is a product of pure stupidity. This post and the comments in response to it illustrate what I am talking about:

http://healthcorrelator.blogspot.com/2010/05/atheism-is-recent-neolithic-invention.html

Waiting for my local library to get a copy of Pandora's Seed by Spencer Wells. In it, he examines the unforeseen costs of farming, which began to transform society 10,000 years ago (using a scientific timescale), such as diabetes and obesity.

Definitely one of man's worst inventions.

Interesting fact:  The Catholic church will not use anything other than wheat to make the wafers for the Eucharist.  If you have wheat intolerance, you can request a low-gluten wafer.  But a non-wheat wafer will never be used as part of that sacrament, no matter how badly one might react to wheat.

I think that stance is a bit much, but I am not a devout Catholic.

Dr. D.
As the Brits say; you are on a losing wicket.

No person of religion will be pursued to move from the crowd. That is why they follow.

Great post! I've never understood how people can take the Bible literally. As someone mentioned in the comments, it's mainly poetry, and it describes a frame of reference and customs of thousands of years ago. Would be very weird to apply all that literally to our high-tech society.

I looked the Bible fragment up in Dutch. It says he has to bake it on human dung (i.e. using the dung as fuel). The fun thing is that a couple of verses later Ezechiel complains and says he has never eaten anything impure in his life and then God gives in and says, 'OK then, you can use cattle dung instead of human dung.'

Sounds to me like the beginning work on "fecal transplant".

But, here's the question: do you think the Ezekiel Bread is worth eating for health reasons?

Other translations have the dung as a source of fuel.  
As much fat as I eat, you'd probably have to put a wick in it.
I don't think that would give it a nice smoke flavor or anything.

I think some of these comments are missing the point. Whether the dung was used as fuel or incorporated into the recipe makes little difference to the interpretive thrust of the passage. According to Mosaic ceremonial law (which was typological, not perpetual), excrement was to be covered with dirt. You don't touch it, and you certainly don't cook with it. The point is that the bread was polluted, and this served as a typological symbol of Israel's pollution and rejection. Israel, the elect and "clean" nation, has become filthy.

God didn't make Ezekiel write this stuff down so we could whip up a great recipe 2400 years later. And by the way, the same goes for the book of Daniel. Just because Daniel and his buddies ate nothing but vegetables and water for ten days doesn't mean that vegetarianism is the best diet. That's not even close to the original intent of the passage. Yet I see these kinds of non-contextual claims all the time. It saddens me when I see fellow Christians using the Bible this way.

FYI: The "Wheat and the Bible" article can be accessed in its entirety on my website here: http://www.reforminghealth.com/Wheat_and_the_Bible.pdf

David

Thanks, David.

For anyone else interested, David's article provides a very nice overview of the broader topic of Wheat and the Bible.

Dr. Davis, I appreciate your courage in tackling this difficult subject. Dr. Kurt Harris has also discussed the fact that even traditional methods of processing wheat do not eliminate all of its negative qualities: http://www.paleonu.com/panu-weblog/2009/12/28/avoid-poison-or-neutralize-it.html.

Religious concerns are undoubtedly one of the trickiest issues that biologically appropriate diets raise. Everyone on the planet is not going to abandon what they see as their religion principles for health reasons, so I try to meet people where they're at. For those Christians who tell me that wheat must be healthy because it's in the New Testament and the Levitical diet, I say, sure, the Levitical diet is older and healthier than the SAD of today, but there was an even earlier diet in the Bible that's even healthier. It's composed of God-made foods instead of man-made foods. It usually occurs to them that this is the diet of wild foods available at the time of humanity's creation, which I also refer to as the "Garden of Eden diet", which was free of wheat bread, even unleavened, and certainly wouldn't contain any pizza, pasta or processed breakfast cereal. This doesn't always convince people, but it rarely fails to give them pause.

Plus, in Genesis 3:17-19, bread is part of a curse, not a blessing. So wheat could be regarded as a blessing compared to starvation, but a curse or penance compared to the original Biblical foods of the Creator's making.

Also, at times in the Bible, suffering is treated as an opportunity for penance or purification. It doesn't mean the bad stuff that causes the suffering (ie wheat) is "good" in and of itself. Perhaps this could be a way to explain Jesus' direction to eat bread in remembrance of Him? I generally avoid this subject as potentially too touchy, so I'm curious for input from wheat-avoiding Christians on how they deal with this.

On top of all the above, bread is no longer necessary for survival in wealthy modern cultures, like it may have been in some of the regions and times covered by the Bible. So the contexts are very different.

Hope this helps.

Paleo Phil,

As a wheat-avoiding Christian, I deal with this issue by actually trying to return the focus to the intent of the Biblical text(s). Was it the biblical author's intent to communicate wheat/grain as perpetually appropriate and required foods for all time (unlikely), or was it rather simply that the biblical narrative existed within an agricultural context and was thus accommodated to those times? I think the latter option is the reasonable one.

In the biblical account, all of creation is said to be "good" (as opposed to Gnosticism, which says that matter is intrinsically evil) but I think it is a mistake to take this as synonymous with "harmless," and it is important to remember that despite being "good," elements within creation can be either appropriate or inappropriate depending on the use and context. Plant toxins are "good" in the creational sense in that they make for a balanced and workable ecosystem, but are relatively "bad" for the unwary animal that eats them. The wheat/grain issue is no different. Grains might be creationally good and play an important role somewhere in the broader order of things, but this doesn't mean they're harmless if the circumstances are right (e.g. genetic modification, improper preparation methods, etc., etc.).

Appealing to the "Garden of Eden diet" might work for some Christians, but I think there's a deeper problem going on. Too many modern Christians see the Bible as a sort of "prescription" for what they should or should not eat. For instance, the Levitical diet (clean vs unclean foods) is often pointed to as the ultimate "healthy diet." However, the health aspects had nothing to do with the actual declared purpose of the restrictions. The diet was purely typological and temporary, and any health benefits were merely coincidental side-benefits. These typological requirements have had an antitypical fulfillment, however, so the diet should have no bearing on anyone today.

Likewise, many Christians point to the supposedly vegetarian diet in Genesis as the "original" diet that mankind was created for. But again, this misses the point of the author's literary intent. What was going on in the Genesis creation account? Was Moses telling us how to eat, or was he telling us something completely different? Most Christians are clueless here. As it turns out, the creation story has nothing to do with scientific explanations or dietary prescriptions. It was written in an ancient Near Eastern (ANE) context where creation myths abounded, and Moses was contrasting the Hebrew God with the surrounding deities of the ancient world. The account is not relating scientific facts, but is rather a literary polemic written to combat other ANE pagan religions point for point. The God of Israel is not like Ptah, or Shu, or Marduk, or Baal. The Genesis account powerfully overturns the Enuma Elish and other ANE creation stories. That was its historical intent.

Unless one is familiar with ANE culture, many of the subtleties within the Genesis account will not make sense, and you will end up with an interpretive disaster, like Young-Earth Creationism or Vegetarianism, for instance. The Bible does say that God created, but it does not tell us how He created. This is nowhere near the intent of the original author.

(Continued)

As I read the chapter, it looks more like Ezekiel is instructed to act in a symbolic manner.  He is instructed to symbolically lay seige to a model of Jerusalem that is drawn or built on a tile--even building miniature seige engines. In essence, the call to moral behavior in the book is a "seige" against the transgressions done within the city.  Thus, the "bread" is also to be made and eaten as a symbol.  The context is fairly plain.  Nowhere is there any statement that Israel, or even just Jerusalem, is to make or eat the stuff.  Ezekiel is told to bake and eat the bread "in their sight" or "in the sight of the people" and then tell anyone who sees him that this is the level of wretchedness they will be reduced to, I presume because of their faithlessness and obstinacy after many warnings, given the general context of the Book of Ezekiel.

Thus, "Ezekiel bread" is actually a symbol of the wrath of God against the obstinately faithless and not a "recipe" for what God wants a faithful believer to eat daily.

I've been taking vitamin D for about five months now after reading Dr. Davis' excellent blog.
Was taking two Thompson's D 1000 caps/day. Latest test result for 25 hydroxy came back at 142 nmol/l so have cut back to one cap/day. So yes, dose depends on body type and sun level (summer here).

I've just done the conversion to ng/mL. Is that by dividing by 2.5? Perhaps I should keep up the two caps/day?

Yes. 142 nmol/L = 56.8 mg/dl.

Thanks for blogging on this, Dr. Davis.  I just got my test for the first time and was alarmed that I came in at only 30 ng/mL after supplementing with 1000 IU daily for about a year.  I had previously lived in Syracuse, NY, the cloudiest city just behind Seattle.  And on a grain-based crap diet, too.  No longer.  Here's my vitamin D story:  http://sparkasynapse.blogspot.com/2009/03/vitamin-d-results.html

I've been wheat-free for 9 months now, but this makes me really curious about my lipid profile...  I still have a ways to go to reach optimum health.  I'm only 34 so hopefully plenty of time to correct this problem.  Unfortunately for my older relatives they were not so lucky.  Cancers, diabetes, heart disease abound.

Have you any comment on this:
http://www.cholesterol-and-health.com/Vitamin-D.html

Article in yesterday NY Times regarding high doses of D3 protecting against fractures:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/31/health/research/31aging.html?ref=health
Unfortunate that the title says pills not capsules.

I was also very shocked with my vitamin d test results. After 5 months @ 6000iu daily my level was only 34 ng/mL. It is winter but I work outside and seldom use suncreen.

The Toronto study suggests there are polymorphisms of the D-binding protein. Isn't this a separate entity than VDR, which is present on cellular surface in many tissues? Maybe I am misunderstanding something ....Thomas

Dr. Davis, should runner's use some suncreen? I was reading this article and decided to ask here: http://dailyviews.runnersworld.com/2009/03/i-will-never-ev.html

As the evidence currently stands everyone should wear sunscreen *and* supplement vitamin D. (benefits of red & blue light can be had without dangerous UVR)

Basically, we should all be getting full-spectrum sunlight in moderate amounts.  Moderate means that you have browning or slight reddening of the skin (if you're still red the next day, that was too much).  This does increase your risk of carcinomas (a low risk type of cancer), but minimizes your risk of melanomas (an extraordinarily high risk type of cancer).  Repeated sunburns increases your risk of melanoma and should be avoided if at all possible.

As a runner, it's often difficult to control the length of time you spend in the sun to moderate your exposure.  The length of time you spend running will usually have more to do with your exercise goals than your sun-exposure goals.  This means that you will most likely not be able to maintain moderation and would put yourself at increased risk of dangerous cancers.

So starting from a completely different set of assumptions, I reach the same conclusion as Kismet, that you should probably be wearing sunscreen and supplementing with Vitamin D3 gelcaps.

Ricardo

Skin Cancer/Sunscreen - the Dilemma

and everyone else will benefit from  watching the Edward Gorham's video or if time is short at least look at the slides used in his presentation
Skin Cancer/Sunscreen -- the Dilemma slides PDF
No one should ever allow skin to burn. Prolonged UVB exposure   processes any vitamin d near the skin surface into suprasterols that are not usable, so alternating short sun sessions with time for the skin to cool down and Vitamin D to be absorbed will optimize the process.

This lecture is entertaining and informative:
Vitamin D

I have always purchased Vitamin D3 from fish oil but discovered while shopping this weekend that there is also a Vitamin D3 obtained from 'wool' or 'lanolin'.  I had never seen this before.  Which is preferable? from fish oil or from lanolin?

thanks,
nancy

Can someone list the effects of overdosing on D3?

Dr. Davis,
Isn't a catheter used for an angiogram?  I thought an angiogram is a necessity before surgery for an aortic abdominal aneurysm?  What are the other alternatives if catheters make so much rubbish?  Just wondering since my mother is considering having surgery for her AAA and needs to have an angiogram first.
Thanks,
Josephine Keliipio
Hawaii

Dr. Davis doesn't answer questions posted to his blog any longer. He announced this some time ago.

I think the point of his little story about being green is to avoid having to have such a procedure done in the first place. I don't believe he is suggesting that you ask the Hospital to recycle all the left over rubbish from such a procedure. At the rate of pay of those people, they'd probably have to charge you a couple of hundred dollars to sort everything out that could be recycled..  

I am only a lay person but I believe there is no alternative (less rubbish producing that is) to the procedure your Mom needs done. Don't worry about the trash and focus on your Mom's outcome instead.

Good luck with your Mom's procedure.

Catheter angiogram is no longer needed to demonstrate arteries, especially arterial anatomy in the abdomen, extremities,head and neck, including, carotids and intracerebral arteries, arteries in the arm or legs. There is now, an alternative, non-invasive. This consist of CT, CTA, or even better, without radiation an MRI,MRA. The only indication for catheter angiogram is if there is plan for angioplasty, or placement of a stent.
No one or nobody should be subjected, to a catheter angiogram, in this day and age.
I hope this helps.

Dr. Davis,

Much obliged for the post.  It provides me with a wonderful counter to claims that a grain-based diet has less of an environmental impact.

Wheat=Heart Disease=Medical Waste

jonathan

Anonymous #2,
Thanks for your comment about angiograms. I am still learning about this procedure and am glad to know that there may be other alternatives. My mom had no plans for a stent or an angioplasty but it seems that angiograms are the standard for elderly patients electing to fix AAAs. Anyway, lots of questions to ask the cardiologist when we see him again in a few weeks. Josephine

Mmmm...stay out of the surgical ICU also, if you can help it. We generated on average 3-4 large cans of waste per room (14) per shift (12hr) per day. Efforts to separate out recyclables were futile. And let's not even get into hand washing. This was in 2000. I hope things have improved.