Super size me in little bits and pieces

17. October 2006 William Davis (1)


Alvin came into the office for consultation on his cholesterol values: LDL 198 mg/dl, HDL, 43 mg/dl, triglycerides 143 mg/dl. He says that he doesn't really try to choose healthy foods but he restricts his overall calorie intake by following the Weight Watcher's exchange approach.

Every morning, 7 days a week, Alvin eats a Sausage McMuffin for breakfast. He justified this by skipping lunch to make up for the 450 calories in the Sausage McMuffin, and not eating anything until dinner.

Can this work? Can you eat foods with unhealthy ingredients but make up the excessive calories by cutting back elsewhere?

The nutritional composition of McDonald's Sausage McMuffin includes 27 grams of total fat (10 gm saturated); 255 mg cholesterol; 950 mg sodium; 31 gm carbohydrate; 2 grams fiber. In other words, it's essentially the same as butter with sugar on it--pure fat, processed wheat, with little fiber or nutritive value.

For Alvin, this is an extremely unhealthy way to eat. His lipid patterns are just the tip of the iceberg: multiple hidden factors are also at work to create heart disease, atherosclerosis in other territories outside the heart, diabetes, high blood pressure, and cancer.

I think the effects are not much different than what Morgan Spurlock achieved in his Super Size Me documentary, but in little bits and pieces. Eating at McDonald's "restaurants" three times a day yielded frightening changes in his lipids, liver function, kidney function, not to mention his appearance and the way he felt. Alvin is doing the same thing, though in less dramatic fashion.

I see this very frequently: people mimicking the experience of Spurlock, just a little at a time, with overindulgence in processed fats and starches.

When you seen a set of Mcdonald's golden arches (or any fast food restaurant, for that matter), run as fast as you can in the other direction. Such indulgences, even in small bits and pieces, still creates a mess of your health.

View from the precipice

15. October 2006 William Davis (0)

Many people, upon first learning of their CT heart scan score, feel like they're on the edge of a sharp drop. It can feel like you're facing a vast, unknown abyss. At the bottom, all those dreaded things that can happen to you: heart attack, heart failure, hospitals, even dying.

I've encountered this "deer in the headlights" look many times. It truly can be frightening to hear that your heart scan score is 300, or 500, or whatever.

What I find truly frightening, however, is when your score prompts the usual array of misinformation commonly dispensed by physicians: "That's so bad you need a heart catheterization", "Nobody knows why people get calcified plaque", or "Reversal is impossible". All absolute bunk.

Let your fear motivate you to do something about your risk for heart disease. Aim for reversal of your coronary plaque and seek out the tools to achieve this. It is possible and, in fact, we do it all the time. I can't claim 100% success, but the majority of people who engage in an effort like the Track Your Plaque program to reverse coronary plaque succeed. Even a substantial slowing of plaque growth from the expected 30% per year is better than submitting to the conventional approach.

At the very least, get both LDL and HDL cholesterol around 60 mg/dl. This alone is a major plus in reducing the risks associated with your heart scan score. It doesn't guaranteee reversal, but it sure tips the odds in your favor.

Organic Rice Krispies?

13. October 2006 William Davis (0)


Breakfast cereal manufacturing giant, Kelloggs, is launching a line of three cereals that will carry the "organic" designation: Organic Rice Krispies, Organic Raisin Bran, and Organic Frosted Mini-Wheats.

This reminds me of the advertisements I've seen for "fresh fried chicken", or "fresh from the can", or "contains only pure cane sugar". How about organic tobacco? Would that make cigarettes healthier?

The TV ad ends with the slogan "Childood is calling!" Oh, those marketers are a shrewd, clever bunch. I worry that they're so clever that most people will fall for these ludicrous tricks.

Don't fall for these thinly-shrouded marketing shenanigans. Organic? Who cares. These foods remain unhealthy whether or not they contain pesticide residues. Take a look at the nutritional composition: Rice Krispies, organic or not, is sugar to your body. It is the sort of food that creates pre-diabetes, diabetes, makes us fat, and fans the flames of lipoprotein patterns like small LDL, VLDL, and postprandial particles, all of which is like throwing cow manure on the weed patch of your coronary plaque.

Nuts as functional foods

13. October 2006 William Davis (0)
Food manufacturers gave nuts a bad name when they started adding evil ingredients to them. "Party mix", "honey-roasted", mixed nuts, etc., are made with added hydrogenated oils, salt, sugar, excessive quantities of raisins, or other added ingredients that turned a healthy food--nuts--into something that made us fat and hypertensive, raised LDL, dropped HDL, and raised blood pressure.

But nuts themselves are, for the most part, very healthy foods. The very best are nuts with a brown fiber coating like almonds, walnuts, and pecans. Nearly all nuts also come rich in monounsaturated oils similar to that in olive oil. Although calorie-dense, nuts tend to be very filling and slash your appetite for other foods. I have never seen anyone gain weight by adding raw nuts to their diet. In fact, I find adding raw nuts cuts craving for sweets.

Nuts are also among the most concentrated sources of magnesium, containing around 150 mg per 1/2 cup serving. As most Americans are at least marginally if not severely deficient in magnesium, this really helps. Magnesium deficiency is a prominent aspect of "metabolic syndrome" and resistance to insulin.




Some nuts have added benefits like the l-arginine content of almonds or the linolenic acid content of walnuts. However, I think the real health "punch" comes from the fiber and monounsaturate content.

Add 1/4-1/2 cup of raw almonds, walnuts, or pecans per day to your diet and what can you expect? The effects that I see every day that are relevant to plaque control/heart scan score-reducing efforts include:

--Reduction in LDL--usually a 20 mg/dl drop, sometimes more.

--Reduction in triglycerides, especially if nuts replace processed carbohydrate calories. This may be because the fiber and monounsaturate content of nuts reduces blood sugar and the effective glycemic index of any accompanying foods.

--Modest blood pressure reduction.

--Though somewhat inconsistent, partial suppression of the dreaded small LDL particle pattern. We struggle with turning off the small LDL pattern in some people, and raw nuts can provide a real advantage.

If that isn't enough, the fiber content also makes your bowels regular.

Unless there's some reason to avoid nuts (e.g., allergy), nuts should be a part of your heart scan score reducing program. Shop around, as prices can vary wildly. I've been paying $12.99 for a 3 lb bag of raw almonds from Sam's Club, though I've seen almonds elsewhere for up to $12.99 per pound.

For additional commentary, go to one of my favorite Blogs, http://fanaticcook.blogspot.com. The Fanatic Cook's recent post, The Season for Walnuts , provides additional discussion on walnuts and the recent study showing how they improve "endothelial function". The nutritionist behind this Blog has fabulous insights into food, including the concept of "functional foods", i.e., using foods as a treatment tool. She is also unfailingly entertaining.

Can you tell the difference?

12. October 2006 William Davis (0)
Stan is 55 years old. He feels fine, is in moderately good physical condition. His LDL cholesterol is 135 mg/dl, HDL 43 mg/dl, triglycerides 167 mg/dl, total cholesterol 211 mg/dl.

Can you tell me whether Stan has heart disease or not?

How about Charles? Charles has an LDL cholesterol of 127 mg/dl, HDL of 44 mg/dl, triglycerides of 98 mg/dl, and total cholesterol of 191 mg/dl. He is also reasonably fit and feels fine. Can you tell whether Charles has heart disease?

If you can't, don't feel bad. Neither can your doctor. But this is the folly of using cholesterol for risk prediction.

Stan's heart scan score: 0

Charles' heart scan score: 978

Look even more closely at Stan's and Charles' cholesterol numbers. Is there some fine distinction we overlooked? What if we calculated total cholesterol to HDL ratio? Or LDL/HDL ratio?

No matter how you squeeze it, shake it, beat it with a stick, you simply cannot use cholesterol numbers to predict heart disease in specific individuals. Yes, the higher your LDL cholesterol and lower your HDL, the higehr your total cholesterol to HDL ratio, the greater the likelihood of heart disease. But you can simply cannot tell in a specific individual at a specific point in time. If you've seen your doctor puzzle over the numbers, understand that he/she is trying to make sense out of something that doesn't make sense, no matter how hard he/she tries.

You simply need to measure the disease itself: get a CT heart scan, the only measure of atherosclerotic coronary plaque that you have access to.

By the way, if you haven't seen it yet, go to the Track Your Plaque website (www.cureality.com) to see the news piece reporting the American Heart Association's much overdue position statement on CT heart scanning. The AHA has finally released a statement which, in effect, provides their "official" endorsement. Blocked by political shenanigans behind the scenes for several years, the guidelines finally made it to press. The only real difference it makes to me is that my patients may finally get their heart scans paid for by insurance, once the insurance companies realize that it's getting tougher and tougher to dodge their responsibility.

Statin agents and muscle aches

11. October 2006 William Davis (2)
How common are muscle aches with the statin drugs?

It depends on who you ask. If you ask the drug manufacturers, they will tell you no more than 2% of people who take them. They back this up with the experience in tens of thousands of people in published clinical trials.

What if we ask people who take them outside of clinical trials. How many then? I estimate, from my large experience, over 80%! In other words, muscle aches are inevitable in nearly everyone who takes them. The longer you take them, the higher your dose, the more likely muscle aches are going to be.

Why the disconnect between published data and real-world experience? I really don't know. In some instances, the differences are dramatic. The ASTEROID trial, for instance, in which Crestor, 40 mg, was given for two years, only resulted in 8% of people dropping out because of side-effects. My experience: everybody--nobody can tolerate this dose for any length of time.

Let me qualify what "muscle aches" mean. It means achiness and/or weakness, usually mild, occasionally moderate to severe, worse upon awakening and less with use. It can affect many muscles or it can involve only one. Rarely is it incapacitating but it is commonly annoying and frightening. It commonly shows up as gradually diminishing strength with exercise. Strength usually returns promptly upon stopping the offending drug.

"Rhabdomyolysis", or true muscle destruction is, fortunately, very unusual in otherwise well people. People with abnormal kidney function, diabetes, and other concurrent illnesses are somewhat more prone. But in reality, rhabdomyolysis is unusual. I've personally seen it twice, both in people sick for other reasons.

Coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10) supplementation has been a godsend for us. At least 4 out of 5 people who require statins and develop muscle aches respond favorably, but it requires 100 mg per day. The preparation must be oil-based to work, not powder in a capsule which exerts no effect. Some people get by with less; some require as much as 300 mg per day. I've had favorable experiences with the CoQ10 from Sam's Club, GNC, Vitamin Shoppe, and Life Extension (www.LEF.org).

The Track Your Plaque target for LDL cholesterol is 60 mg/dl. Many people do indeed use statins to achieve this level, the level of LDL that amplifies your chances of heart disease reversal, i.e., reduction of heart scan score. The only drawback that I'm aware of with CoQ10 replacement is cost. Beyond this, it's a benign supplement that even supplies higher energy for some people who take it.

More catheterizations would make me happy!

11. October 2006 William Davis (0)
I received this fax today from a cardiologist seeking a position:

"I would prefer to perform as many interventions [stents, angioplasties, etc.] as possible..."

That about sums it up, doesn't it? The goal of this young man, trained in major universities including Columbia University, Harvard, and Emory, is not to pursue an avenue of investigation or healthcare that yields real answers. His goal is to perform as many procedures as possible.

This attitude is deeply ingrained in cardiologists. It's also shared by all procedural medical specialties: the drive to do more and more procedures. It's not because it does more good for the public, but it fulfills a primitive impulse to spread your influence, enlarge your territory, and--of course--make more money.

Personally, I find this impulse repulsive. The fact that this young cardiologist looking for a position is willing to make this statement out in the open demonstrates how widely accepted this attitude is. Imagine your cancer surgeon, looking for a new job, said, "I'm looking to remove as many tumors as I can."

My colleagues have lost sight of the fact that we're trying to reduce or eliminate disease, not enrich our pockets or service some primitive impulse to beat others at our game.

"I hate fish oil!"

9. October 2006 William Davis (1)
I get this comment occasionally, usually from the fishy belching that can occur, rarely because of other crazy effects like rash, fishy body odor, etc.

In the vast majority, fish oil is a benign but wonderfully effective agent. Track Your Plaque followers know that fish oil, starting at 4000 mg per day of a standard 1000 mg capsule preparation, dramatically reduces triglycerides and thereby raises HDL, partially suppresses small LDL, and is the best agent available for reducing postprandial (after eating) abnormalities like IDL and certain VLDL fractions.

However, an occasional person (about 1 in 20) just doesn't like the effects. Are there alternatives? Fish oil packs such a wallop of beneficial effects that can not be replaced by any other single agent or lifestyle practice. For this reason, we have a number of easy strategies to enhance your tolerance for fish oil. (Of course, if your and/or you doctor determine that you're allergic to fish oil, then you should indeed avoid it; thankfully, this is rare.)

Helpful strategies include:

--Refrigerate fish oil capsules--this cuts back on fish belching.
--Take only with meals. This also may increase fish oil's benefits on suppressing after-eating lipoprotein abnormalities.
--Take an enteric-coated preparation--this delays breakdown of the tablet/capsule, making fishy belching less of an issue. Sam's Club has an inexpensive preparation.
--Take liquid fish oil. Usually orange or lemon flavored, liquid fish oil may be a faint fishy taste and odor, but usually not as prominent as the capsules. There's also less stomach upset.
--Coromega--a paste form of fish oil available at health food stores or through http://www.coromega.com. Coromega tastes fruity and comes in little squeeze envelopes.
--Frutol--Pharmax, a British company, makes another fruity fish oil that is non-oily and tastes like apricot. It's actually fairly reasonably priced, too. However, it is hard to find. The only way I know to get is to go online at www.pharmaxllc.com. You may have to actually order through a health care provider.

When using any preparation of fish oil, the best way to determine your dose is to add up the EPA and DHA content. For instance, if you use a fish oil liquid that contains 320 mg EPA and 240 mg DHA per teaspoon, you will need two teaspoons a day to achieve the equivalent of our starting dose of 1200 mg of EPA+DHA, usually provided by 4000 mg total in 4 capsules. Note that some lipid and lipoprotein disorders will require higher doses, e.g., 1800 mg EPA+DHA for high triglycerides (>200 mg/dl) or high IDL.

Sudden death in athletes

6. October 2006 William Davis (0)
A recent report in the Journal of the American Medical Association details how a group in the Veneto region of Italy cut back on the incidence of sudden cardiac death in athletes by a simple screening program.



You can read the abstract of the article at http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/296/13/1593.

Although sudden death in athletes is still a rare event, it is especially tragic when it happens. In this population, the incidence was 3.6 deaths per 100,000 athletes aged 12 to 35 years. By implementing a simple screening program that involved only a physical examination and an EKG, an astounding 89% reduction in sudden death was documented.

What lessons does this hold for those of us interested in coronary plaque reversal? Beyond the obvious lesson of pointing out the great benefit of simple screening of athletes, I believe that it tells us the value of simple screening tools for heart disease in general. It is my strong belief that, if we were to implement CT heart scans among the broad population of men 40 years and over, women 50 years and over--without regard to cholesterol or other relatively lame risk identifiers--we could slash the risk for heart attack and death 90% or more. Putting CT heart scans into the hands of the public makes your coronary risk obvious. It takes the guesswork out of risk predictors like cholesterol and high blood pressure.

But heart scans are already available, you say! Yes, of course they are. But the lack of insurance reimbursement continues to be a restricting factor for many people, despite the number of lives that could be potentially saved and the money that would be saved in the long run by reducing need for major heart procedures. The continuing resistance to prevention by my cardiology colleagues and the persistent ignorance of primary care physicians also remain major impediments.

But it's getting better. You don't have to be chained by ignorance. Put your CT heart scan to good use.

My heart scan was wrong!

6. October 2006 William Davis (0)


Tom came into the office ready for a confrontation.

Tom's wife insisted that he see me to discuss the implications of his CT heart scan score of 459. At age 50, this was clearly bad news that placed Tom in the 99th percentile (worst 1% of men in his age group).

But Tom had already undergone a stress test. There had apparently been a small abnormality, and a heart catheterization had been performed by another cardiologist. "They told me they didn't need to do anything. No stent, no ballon, no bypass, nothing!"

I asked, "Did they tell you that there was any plaque or blockages seen?"

"Yeah, but he said it was nothing. So the heart scan was wrong!"

I've been here many times before. I explained to Tom that, no, his heart scan was not wrong. All the tests he'd undergone siimply provided a different perspective on the same disease. You could say:

--The stress test, being a test of blood flow, may have been abnormal because of the abnormal constrictive behavior of arteries containing plaque, known as "endothelial dysfunction", because the inner lining of arteries (the endothelium) control the tone of the artery. Abnormal constriction in arteries with plaque is quite common.

--The catheterization simply showed that no plaque had collected in a configuration to block flow, thus no stent, etc., since flow was normal. But there was indeed plaque.

All three tests were right; none were wrong. They all provided a little different perspective on the same process. Of course, I favor the heart scan as the means to identify, precisely measure, and track the atherosclerotic plaque in your arteries. The stress test is too crude and only measures flow, the catheterization is not something you'd want to undergo year after year. Catheterization also is too crude a measure to precisely track plaque growth or reversal.

So I explained to Tom that, even though a stent or similar procedure was unnecessary, he remained at substantial risk for heart attack due to plaque "rupture". In fact, Tom's heart attack risk was 5% per year, or approximately 50% over the next decade. That is, indeed, substantial. In fact, you might say that, of the three tests Tom underwent, only the heart scan revealed his true risk.

You just THINK you're low-carb

27. February 2010 William Davis (72)
Systematically checking postprandial (after-eating) blood sugars is providing some great insights into crafting a better diet for many people.

I last discussed the concept of postprandial glucose checks in To get low-carb right, you need to check blood sugars.

Here are some important lessons that many people--NON-diabetic people, most with normal blood glucoses or just mildly increased--are learning:

Oatmeal yields high blood sugars. Even if your fasting blood sugar is 90 mg/dl, a bowl of oatmeal with skim milk, walnuts, and some berries will yield blood sugars of 150-200 mg/dl in many people.

Cheerios yields shocking blood sugars. 200+ mg/dl is not uncommon in non-diabetics. (Diabetics have 250-350 mg/dl.)

Fruits like apples and bananas increase blood sugar to 130 mg/dl or higher.

Odd symptoms, such as mental "fog," fatigue, and a fullness in the head, are often attributable to high blood sugars.

A subset of people with lipoprotein(a) can have wildly increased blood sugars despite their slender build and high aerobic exercise habits.


Once you identify the high blood sugar problem, you can do something about it. The best place to start is to reduce or eliminate the sugar-provoking food.

The LDL-Fructose Disconnect

26. February 2010 William Davis (8)
I believe that we can all agree that the commonly obtained Friedewald LDL cholesterol (what I call "fictitious" LDL cholesterol) is wildly inaccurate. 100%--yes, 100% inaccuracy--is not at all uncommon.

This flagrant inaccuracy, unacceptable in virtually every other discipline (imagine your airplane flight to New York lands in Pittsburgh--close enough, isn't it?), is highlighted in the University of California study by Stanhope et al I discussed previously.

32 participants consumed either a diet enriched with either fructose or glucose. Compared to the effect of glucose, after 10 weeks fructose:

Increased LDL cholesterol (calculated) by 7.6%

Increased Apoprotein B (a measure of the number of LDL particles) by 24%

Increased small dense LDL by 41%

Increased oxidized LDL by 12.6%


In other words, conventional calculated LDL substantially underestimates the undesirable effects of fructose. The divergence between calculated LDL and small LDL is especially dramatic. (By the way, this same divergence applies to the studies suggesting that calculated LDL cholesterol is reduced by low fat diets--While calculated LDL may indeed be reduced, small LDL goes way up, a striking divergence.)

This is yet another reason to not rely on this "fictitious" LDL cholesterol value that, inaccuracies notwithstanding, serves as the foundation for a $27 billion per year industry.

"I dream about bread"

25. February 2010 William Davis (14)
Marion sat in my office, sobbing.

It had been 4 weeks since the last piece of bread, bagel, or bun had passed her lips.

"I can't do it! I just can't do it! I've tried to eliminate wheat, but it's making me crazy. I'm having dreams about bread!"

Yes, Timmy, such dark corners of human behavior are truly unveiled by removing wheat from the diet. (See the previous Heart Scan Blog post, Wheat withdrawal.)

This is a real phenomenon: Wheat is the crack cocaine of the masses. Maybe you don't exchange $100 bills in dark corners of an inner city crack house, but I'll bet you paid $3.99 for your latest fix of French bread.

Just in the last 2 weeks, people in my office who have eliminated wheat have experienced:

14 lbs weight loss in 14 days

Increased mental clarity, reduced moodiness, deeper sleep

70% reductions in small LDL

More than 300 mg/dl reductions in triglycerides

Relief from chronic scalp rash


I could go on.

All the while, the USDA, the American Heart Association, the American Diabetes Association, the American Dietetic Association, the Surgeon General's Office all advise you to eat more "healthy whole grains."

70% of people (NOT 100%, but the majority) will experience unexpected health benefits by eliminating this corrupt, unphysiologic product called wheat from their diet.

You won't know until you try.

Prototypical Lipoprotein(a)

25. February 2010 William Davis (23)
Here's the prototypical male with lipoprotein(a):



Several features stand out in the majority of men with lipoprotein(a), Lp(a):

Slender--Sometimes absurdly so: BMIs of 21-23 are not uncommon. These are the people who claim they can't gain weight.

Intelligent--Above average to way above average intelligence is the rule.

Gravitate to technical work--Plenty of engineers, scientists, accountants, and other people who work with numbers and/or technical details are more likely to have Lp(a).

Enjoy high levels of aerobic performance--I tell my Lp(a) patients that, if they want to see a bunch of other people with Lp(a), go to a marathon or triathlon. They'll see plenty of people with the pattern among the aerobically-elite.

Are rabid fans of Star Trek.


Okay, I made the last one up. But the rest are uncannilly true, shared by the majority (though not all) men with Lp(a).

Why? I can only speculate that the gene(s) for Lp(a) are closely linked to gene(s) for intelligence of a quantitative kind and some factor that enhances aerobic performance or yields a desirable emotional state with exercise.

Oddly, the same patterns tend not to occur in women in Lp(a). I have yet to discern a personality or body configuration phenotype among the ladies.

Gastric emptying: When slower is better

20. February 2010 William Davis (18)
When it comes to the Internet and Nascar, speed is good: The faster the better.

But when it comes to gastric emptying (the rate at which food passes from the stomach and into the duodenum and small intestine), slower can be better.

Slower transit time for foods passing through the stomach leads to lower blood sugar, lower blood glucose area under-the-curve (AUC), i.e., reduced blood glucose levels over time. Lower postprandial (after-eating) blood sugars can reduce cardiovascular risk. It can lead to a reduction in net calorie intake and weight loss.

Strategies that can slow gastric emptying include:

--Minimizing fluids during a meal--Drinking a lot of fluids, e.g., water, accelerates gastric emptying by approximately 20%.

--Cinnamon--While the full reason to explain Cassia cinnamon's blood glucose-reducing effect has not been completely worked out, part of the effect is likely to due slowed gastric emptying. Thus, a 1/4-2 teaspoons of cinnamon per day can reduce postprandial blood sugar peaks by 10-25 mg/dl.

--Vinegar--Two teaspoons of vinegar in its various forms slows gastric emptying. The effect is likely due to acetic acid, the compound shared by apple cider vinegar, white vinegar, red wine vinegar, Balsamic vinegar, and other varieties.

--Increased fat content--Fat is digested more slowly and slows gastric emptying time, compared to the rapid transit of carbohydrates.

Not everybody should slow gastric emptying. Diabetics with a condition called diabetic gastroparesis should not use these methods, as they can further slow the abnormal gastric emptying that develops as part of their disease, making a bad situation worse.

However, in the rest of us with normal gastric emptying time, a delay in gastric emptying can reduce blood sugar and induce satiety, effects that can work in your favor in reducing cardiovascular risk.

Genetic vs. lifestyle small LDL

19. February 2010 William Davis (59)
Let me explain what I mean by "genetic small LDL." I think it helps to illustrate with two common examples.

Ollie is 50 years old, 5 ft 10 inches tall, and weighs 253 lbs. BMI = 36.4 (obese). Starting lipoproteins (NMR):

LDL particle number 2310 nmol/L
Small LDL: 1893 nmol/L (1893/2310 = 81.9% of total, a severe small LDL pattern)


Stan is 50 years old, also, 5 ft 10 inches tall, and weighs 148 lbs. BMI = 21.3. Starting lipoproteins:

LDL particle number 1424 nmol/L
Small LDL 1288 nmol/L (1288/1424 = 90.4% of total, also severe)


Both Ollie and Stan go on the New Track Your Plaque diet and eliminate wheat, cornstarch, and sugars, while increasing oils, meats and fish, unlimited raw nuts, and vegetables. They add fish oil and vitamin D and achieve perfect levels of both. Six months later, Ollie has lost 55 lbs, Stan has lost 4 lbs. A second round of lipoproteins:

Ollie:

LDL particle number 1810 nmol/L
Small LDL: 193 nmol/L (193/1810 = 10.6% of total)


Stan:

LDL particle number 1113 nmol/L
Small LDL 729 nmool/L (729/1113 = 65.4% of total)


Ollie has reduced, nearly eliminated, small LDL through elimination of wheat, cornstarch, and sugars, along with weight loss, fish oil, and vitamin D.

Stan, beginning at a much more favorable weight, reduced both total and small LDL with the same efforts, but retains a substantial proportion (65.4%) of small LDL.

Stan's pattern is what I call "genetic small LDL." Of course, this is a presumptive designation, since we've not identified the specific gene(s) that allow this (e.g., gene for variants of cholesteryl ester transfer protein, hepatic lipase, lipoprotein lipase, and others). But it is such a sharp distinction that I am convinced that people like Stan have this persistent pattern as a genetically-determined trait.

Carbohydrate sins of the past

17. February 2010 William Davis (15)
Fifty years ago, diabetes was a relatively uncommon disease. Today, the latest estimates are that 50% of Americans are now diabetic or pre-diabetic.

There are some obvious explanations: excess weight, inactivity, the proliferation of fructose in our diets. It is also my firm belief that the diets advocated by official agencies, like the USDA, the American Heart Association, the American Dietetic Association, and the American Diabetes Association, have also contributed with their advice to eat more “healthy whole grains.”

When I was a kid, I ate Lucky Charms® or Cocoa Puffs® for breakfast, carried Hoho’s® and Scooter Pies® in my lunchbox, along with a peanut butter sandwich on white bread. We ate TV dinners, biscuits, instant mashed potatoes for dinner. Back then, it was a matter of novelty, convenience, and, yes, taste.

What did we do to our pancreases eating such insulin-stimulating foods through childhood, teenage years, and into early adulthood? Did our eating habits as children and young adults create diabetes many years later? Could sugary breakfast cereals, snacks, and candy in virtually unlimited quantities have impaired our pancreas’ ability to produce insulin, leading to pre-diabetes and diabetes many years later?

A phenomenon called glucose toxicity underlies the development of diabetes and pre-diabetes. Glucose toxicity refers to the damaging effect that high blood sugars (glucose) have on the delicate beta cells of the pancreas, the cells that produce insulin. This damage isirreversible: once it occurs, it cannot be undone, and the beta cells stop producing insulin and die. The destructive effect of high glucose levels on pancreatic beta cells likely occurs through oxidative damage, with injury from toxic oxidative compounds like superoxide anion and peroxide. The pancreas is uniquely ill-equipped to resist oxidative injury, lacking little more than rudimentary anti-oxidative protection mechanisms.

Glucose toxicity that occurs over many years eventually leaves you with a pancreas that retains only 50% or less of its original insulin producing capacity. That’s when diabetes develops, when impaired pancreatic insulin production can no longer keep up with the demands put on it.

(Interesting but unanswered question: If oxidative injury leads to beta cell dysfunction and destruction, can antioxidants prevent such injury? Studies in cell preparations and animals suggest that anti-oxidative agents, such as astaxanthin and acetylcysteine, may block beta cell oxidative injury. However, no human studies have yet been performed. This may prove to be a fascinating area for future.)

Now that 50% of American have diabetes or pre-diabetes, how much should we blame on eating habits when we were younger? I would wager that eating habits of youth play a large part in determining potential for diabetes or pre-diabetes as an adult.

The lesson: Don’t allow children to repeat our mistakes. Letting them indulge in a lifestyle of soft drinks, candy, pretzels, and other processed junk carbohydrates has the potential to cause diabetes 20 or 30 years later, shortening their life by 10 years. Kids are not impervious to the effects of high sugar, including the cumulative damaging effects of glucose toxicity.

Saturated fat and large LDL

16. February 2010 William Davis (44)
Here's a half-truth I often encounter in low-carb discussions:

Saturated fat increases large LDL particles


For those of you unfamiliar with the argument, I advocate a low-carbohydrate approach, specifically elimination of all wheat, cornstarch, and sugars, to reduce expression of the small LDL pattern (not to mention reduction of triglycerides, relief from acid reflux and irritable bowel, weight loss, various rashes, diabetes, etc). Small LDL particles have become the most common cause for heart disease in the U.S., exploding on the scene ever since agencies like the USDA and American Heart Association have been advising the public to increase consumption of "healthy whole grains."

This has led some to make the pronouncement that saturated fat increases large LDL, thereby representing a benign effect.

Is this true?

It is true, but only partly. Let me explain.

There are two general categories of factors causing small LDL particles: lifestyle (overweight, excess carbohydrates) and genetics (e.g., variants of the gene coding for cholesteryl-ester transfer protein, or CETP).

If small LDL is purely driven by excess carbohydrates, then adding saturated fat will reduce small LDL and increase large LDL.

If, on the other hand, your small LDL is genetically programmed, then saturated fat will increase small LDL. In other words, saturated fat tends to increase the dominant or genetically-determined form of LDL. If your dominant genetically-determined form is small, then saturated fat increases small LDL particles.

So to say that saturated fat increases large LDL is an oversimplification, one that can have dire consequences in the wrong situation.

Is glycemic index irrelevant?

14. February 2010 William Davis (20)


University of Toronto nutrition scientist, Dr. David Jenkins, was the first to quantify the phenomenon of "glycemic index," describing how much blood sugar increased over 90 minutes compared to glucose. The graph is from their 1981 study, The glycemic index of foods: a physiologic basis for carbohydrate exchange. The research originated with an effort to characterize carbohydrates for diabetics to gain better control over blood sugar.

Since Dr. Jenkins’ original work, thousands of clinical studies have been performed by others exploring this concept. The food industry has also devoted plenty of effort exploiting it (e.g., low-glycemic index noodles, low-glycemic index cereals, etc.).

Most Americans are now familiar with the concept of glycemic index. You likely know that table sugar has a high glycemic index (60), increasing blood sugar to a similar degree as white bread (glycemic index 71). Oatmeal (slow-cooked) has a lower glycemic index (48), since it increases blood sugar less than white bread.

A number of studies have shown that when low glycemic index foods replace high glycemic index foods (e.g., whole wheat bread in place of cupcakes), people are healthier: less diabetes, less heart attack, less high blood pressure. Books have been written about glycemic index, touting its benefits for health and weight control. Health-conscious people will try to substitute low-glycemic index foods for high-glycemic index foods.

So what’s not to like here?

There are several fundamental flaws with the notion that low-glycemic index foods are good for you:

1) Check your blood sugar after a low-glycemic index food like oatmeal. Most non-diabetic adults will show blood sugars in the 140 to 200 mg/dl range. The more central (visceral) fat you have, the higher the value will be. In other words, an apparently “healthy” whole grain food like oatmeal can generate extravagantly high blood sugars. Repeated high blood sugars of 125 mg/dl or greater after eating increase heart disease risk by 50%.

2) Foods like whole wheat pasta have a low glycemic index because the blood sugar effect over the usual 90 minutes is increased to a lesser degree. The problem is that it remains increased for an extended period of up to several hours. In other words, the blood sugar-increasing effect of pasta, even whole grain, is long and sustained.

3) Low-glycemic index foods trigger other abnormalities, such as small LDL particles, triglycerides, and c-reactive protein (a measure of inflammation). While they are not as bad as high-glycemic index foods, they are still quite potent triggers.

Low-glycemic index foods trigger the very same responses as high-glycemic index foods—they’re just less bad. But less bad does not equate to good. Low-glycemic index foods cause weight gain, trigger appetite, increase blood pressure, and lead to the patterns that cause heart disease.

High-glycemic index foods are bad for you. This includes foods made with white flour (bagels, white bread, pretzels). Low-glycemic foods (whole grain bread, whole wheat crackers, whole wheat pasta) are less bad for you—but they are not necessarily good.

Don’t be falsely reassured by foods because they are billed as “low-glycemic index.” View low-glycemic index foods as indulgences, something you might have once in a while, since a slice of whole grain bread is really not that different from a icing-covered cupcake.

Can natural treatments "cure" or "treat" any disease?

30. August 2006 William Davis (0)
According to current FDA policy, the answer is a flat "NO!"

No natural treatment, whether it be fish oil (as a nutritional supplement), l-arginine, vitamin D, magnesium, various flavonoids like theaflavin or resveratrol, can be declared to treat or cure any disease. That's why you see the evasive and vague wording on nutritional supplements, nutraceuticals, and various foods, like "Supports heart health" or "Supports healthy cholesterol". Claiming, for instance, that taking 6000 mg per day of a standard OTC fish will reduce triglycerides and stating so on the label of a supplement is unlawful and prosecutable.

Think what you will of Mr. Kevin Trudeau (author of Natural Cures They Don't Want You to Know About"): visionary, consumer advocate, David vs. the Goliath of the FDA and "Big Pharma", or huckster, scam artist, and one-time felon. But Trudeau got it right on one important issue: The FDA dictates what claims can be made to treat disease. On one of his ubiquitous informercials, Trudeau states:


"...the way the system works today, you have the Food and Drug Administration—the FDA, and you have the drug industry. They really work in tandem. Unfortunately, there’s an unholy alliance there. People don’t know that the majority of commissioners of the FDA, which allegedly regulates the drug industry, and the food industry—Food and Drug Administration, the commissioners of the FDA—the majority of them—go to work directly for the drug companies upon leaving the FDA and are paid millions and millions and millions of dollars. Now in any other format, that would be called bribery; that would be called a conflict of interest; that would be called payoffs. That’s exactly what’s happening right now. So what has occurred is the Food and Drug Administration is really working in tandem with the drug industry to protect their profits. Example: The Food and Drug Administration says that only a drug can diagnose, prevent, or cure any disease."


He goes on to say that

"...the Food and Drug Administration says only a drug--nothing else--can cure, prevent, or diagnose a disease. Therefore the Food and Drug Administration continues to call more and more and more things diseases. Therefore they eliminate all-natural remedies. No one can say what a natural remedy can do if it’s been classified as a disease. So Attention Deficit Disorder is now a disease. Therefore only a drug can cure, prevent, or diagnose it. Cancer is a disease. Acid reflux is now a disease. Obesity is now a disease."

(PLEASE do not construe this as an endorsement of Mr. Trudeau's overall opinions. But I do think he's right on this one point.)

The stated purpose of this restrictive policy is to protect the public. Indeed, in years past before protective legislation, ineffective and even poisonous products were commonly sold as therapeutic treatments. (Remember cocaine and morphine in cold remedies? Lead and other toxic agents were also common.) Unfortunately, a huge gap has emerged as clinical data accumulates that support the efficacy of nutritional treatments and other non-traditional methods to treat or alleviate diseases. Any disease, or anything construed as disease as Trudeau points out, can onlybe treated by a drug.

In the FDA's defense, they have made slow progress in allowing "claims" of benefits for several supplements and food substances, such as the beta-glucan of oat products, soy protein, and most recently barley (for cholesterol reduction). The scrutiny is quite thorough and the wording of the policy is quite specific. Regarding oat products, for instance, the policy states:

"FDA concluded that the beta-glucan soluble fiber of whole oats is the primary component responsible for the total and LDL blood cholesterol-lowering effects of diets that contain these whole oat-containing foods at appropriate levels. This conclusion is based on review of scientific evidence indicating a relationship between the soluble fiber in these whole oat-containing foods and a reduction in the
risk of coronary heart disease.

Food products eligible to bear the health claim include oat bran and rolled oats, such as oatmeal, and whole oat flour...To qualify for the health claim, the whole oat-containing food must provide at least 0.75 grams of soluble fiber per
serving. The amount of soluble fiber needed for an effect on cholesterol levels is about 3 grams per day."

(Source: FDA Talk Paper which can be viewed in its entirety at http://www.fda.gov/bbs/topics/ANSWERS/ANS00782.html.)

In light of the boom in nutritional and non-traditional research that validate or refute efficacy, is such a policy still necessary? Or does it inhibit the open dissemination of information and result in a extraordinary monopolization of health treatment for the drug companies?

This debate will likely rage for the next two or more decades, particularly as drug companies are increasingly viewed as profit-seeking enterprises and more validation is gained by non-drug treatments.

For the moment, don't dismiss a "treatment" because it doesn't come by prescription. But don't reject a drugjust because it is a prescription. We need to strike a healthy, rational balance somewhere in between.

Can procedures alone keep you alive?

29. August 2006 William Davis (0)
My days in the hospital remind me of what heart disease can be like when no preventive efforts are taken--what it used to be like even with my patients before taking a vigorous approach to prevention (though over 12 years ago).

Several cardiologists in my hospital, for instance, express skepticism that heart disease prevention works at all. Yes, they know about the statin cholesterol drug trials. But they claim that, given their experience with the power of coronary disease to overpower an individual's control, statin drugs are just "fluff". Coronary disease is a powerful process that can only begin to be harnessed with major procedures, i.e., a mechanical approach.

So these cardiologists routinely have their patients in the hospital, often once a year, sometimes more, for heart catheterization and "fixing" whatever requires fixing: balloon angioplasty, stents, various forms of atherectomy. Year in, year out, these patients return for their "maintenance" procedures. Their cardiologists maintain that this approach works. The patients go on eating what they like, taking little or no nutritional supplements, and medications prescribed by their primary care physicians for blood pressure, etc. But no real effort towards heart disease prevention beyond these minimal steps.

Can this work? Very little at-home, preventive efforts, but periodic "maintenance" procedures?

It can, perhaps, for a relatively short time of a few years, maybe up to 10 years. But it crumbles after this. The disease eventaully overwhelms the cardiologist's ability to stent or balloon this or that, since it has progressed and plaque has growth diffusely the entire period that maintenance procedures have been performed. In addition, acute illness still occurs with some frequency--in other words, plaque rupture is not affected just because there's a stent in the artery upstream or downstream.

Not to mention this can be misery on you and your life, with risk incurred during each procedure. It's also terribly expensive, with hospitalization easily costing $25,000-$50,000 or more each time. (Compare that to a $250 or so CT heart scan.)


As people become more aware of the potential tools for prevention of heart disease, fewer are willing to submit to the archaic and barbaric practice of "maintenance" heart procedures in lieu of prevention. But it still goes on. If you, or anybody you know, are on this pointless and doomed path, find a new doctor.




Bloodletting, another antiquated health practice

Support your local hospital: HAVE A HEART ATTACK!

25. August 2006 William Davis (0)
I'm kidding, of course. But, in your hospital's secret agenda, that's not too far from the truth. Catastrophes lead to hospital procedures, which then yields major revenues.

Prevention, on the other hand, yields nothing for your hospital. No $8,000 to $12,000 for heart catheterization, several thousand more for a stent, $60,000-plus for a bypass, $25,000 or more for a defibrillator. In other words, prevention of heart attack and all its consequences deprive your hospital of a goldmine of revenue.

The doctors are all too often conspirators. I heard of yet another graphic example today. A man I didn't know called me out of the blue with a question. "I had a heart scan and I had a 'score' that I was told meant a moderate quantity of plaque in my arteries, a score of 157. My doctor said to ignore it. But I got another scan a year later and my score was 178. So I told this to my doctor and he said, 'Let's get you into the hospital. We'll set up a catheterization and then you'll get bypassed.' Of course, I was completely thrown off balance by this. Here I was thinking that the heart scan was showing that my prevention program needed improvement. But my doctor was talking about bypass surgery. Can you help? Does this sound right?"

No, this is absolutely not right. It's another tragedy like the many I hear about every day. Heart scans are, in fact, wonderfully helpful tools for prevention. This man was right: he felt great and the heart scan simply uncovered hidden plaque that should have triggered a conversation on how to prevent it from getting worse. But the doctor took it as a license to hustle the patient into the hospital. Ka-ching!

This sort of blatant money-generating behavior is far from rare. Don't become another victim of the cardiovascular money-making machine. Be alert, be skeptical, and question why. Of course, there are plenty of times when major heart procedures are necessary. But always insist on knowing the rationale behind such decisions, whether it's you or a loved one.

Hospitals contain experts in ILLNESS

25. August 2006 William Davis (0)
Hospitals contain many experts in sickness. This seems obvious. But walk down the hallways of any hospital, and you'll quickly be convinced that hospitals contain almost no experts in health.

People (hospital staff, that is, not the patients) in hospitals are especially good at identifying and treating disease. They lack knowledge of health.

If your nurse is 100 lbs overweight and struggles to walk down the hall because of arthritis in both knees, would you entrust her with health advice?

If your doctor sits down in the cafeteria and eats his lunch of a ham sandwich with cheese on a bun, fried onion rings, and a milkshake and pastry, can you believe that he/she possesses any insight into health and nutrition?

If your physical therapist or cardiac rehabilitation counselor struggles nearly as much as you while climbing a single flight of stairs, can you accept their advice on how to regain your stamina and use exerise to full health advantage?

The answer to all these questions is, of course, no. Hospital staff are generally expert at dressing surgical wounds, stopping bleeding, identifying infections, and providing the support services for surgical and diagnostic procedures. In contrast, they are generally miserable at conveying genuine health advice. They certainly fall short in being examples of health themselves.

To hospitals and their staff, health is a temporary situation that persists only until you become ill. Illness is an inevitability in the hospital staff mindset. Health is a temporary state in between illnesses.

We need to shake off this perverse mentality. Health is the state of life that should dominate our practices and philosophies. Illness via the occasional catastrophe, e.g., broken leg from skiing, car accident, etc., is the province of hospitals. We should gravitate towards this philosphy and away from the over-reliance on hospitals that has come to dominate our present perceptions of health. Hospitals are not glamorous. They are, for the most part, profit-seeking businesses intent on portraying themselves as champions of health.

When I walk down the halls of hospitals, I am shocked and ashamed at the extraordinary examples of ill-health presented by hospital staff. Yet they falsely paint themselves as experts in both illness and health. Don't believe it for a second.

Are there still unexplored causes of heart disease?

23. August 2006 William Davis (0)
I met a woman today. She had her first heart attack at age 37. She just had her 2nd heart attack this morning, at age 40.

Several issues are surprising about her story. First, she's pre-menopausal. Heart attacks before menopause are unusual. We'll occasionally see women have a heart attack before or during menopausal years only if they're heavy smokers and/or they have had diabetes (either type I or type II) for many years. But this young woman had neither. She is slender and has never smoked.

Even more surprising are her basic lipid values: LDL cholesterol 35 mg/dl, HDL 150 mg/dl, triglycerides 317 mg/dl. This is a very unusual pattern.

Unfortunately, this is all developing acutely in the hospital. (I've just met her today--she's not a Track Your Plaquer!) Lipoprotein analysis would be extremely interesting. In particular, I'd like to see whether she has any other markers besides elevated triglycerides of a "post-prandial" abnormality, i.e., persistence of abnormal particles after eating. The high triglycerides make this quite likely.

If this proves true, the omega-3 fatty acids from fish oil will be a lifesaving treatment for her, since they dramatically reduce both triglycerides as well as persistent postprandial particles like intermediate-density lipoprotein (IDL). (Track Your Plaque Members: See the Special Report on Postprandial Abnormalities on the present home page at www.cureality.com for a more in-depth discussion of this fascinating collection of patterns that is just started to be explored.)

In the real world, especially acute care medicine, there's always a kicker: she speaks no English. Unfortunately, communicating the intricacies of a powerful program like ours that aims to identify all causes of heart disease, then corrects then and aims for coronary plaque regression, is difficult if not impossible.

I also do occasionally worry that, given this woman's extraordinary risk at a young age, and overall very unusual lipid patterns (HDL 150?!), if there are causes presently beyond our reach. We have to make use of the tools available to us for now.

Everything causes heart attack!

22. August 2006 William Davis (1)
The media are presently gushing about a recent study that associates caffeine intake with heart attack.

CBS News: That cup of coffee you're craving might not be such a good idea. Research in the September issue of Epidemiology suggests coffee can trigger a heart attack within an hour in some people.


Some reporters and their quoted sources are musing about whether it's the caffeine, cream vs. other whiteners, time of day, interaction with other risk factors, etc.

My advice: Get a grip! How many relatively benign, every day factors in life can be blamed for dire health risks?

The problem with many of these studies is that they are cross-sectional. They do not enroll participants, then "treat" with coffee (or other substance in question) vs. placebo. In other words, it is not a randomized trial, the sort of trial necessary to prove a hypothesis. That's all that can be generated by a study like this one: a hypothesis.

Perhaps there's a bit of warning for the person with uncorrected lipids and lipoproteins, has no idea that they have extensive coronary plaque because they've never had a heart scan, and have a slovenly lifestyle. Maybe that person might have exaggerated risk from a cup of coffee.

But for us, involved and intensively addressing all causes of coronary plaque to the point of stabilizing or reducing it, coffee is likely a non-issue.

For more conversation on coffee and this report, go to the www.cureality.com home page.

Excessive Heart Procedures Makes New York Times Headline

18. August 2006 William Davis (0)

One example of flagrant cardiac procedure excess has made New York Times headlines:


Heart Procedure Is Off the Charts in an Ohio City
The number of angioplasties performed in Elyria is so high that Medicare is starting to ask questions.

(The full article can be accessed through the New York Times website at http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/18/business/18stent.html?pagewanted=2&ei=5094&en=b81be5f43f98a99b&hp&ex=1155960000&partner=homepage)



Cardiologists in little Elyria, Ohio, about a 30-minute drive west of Cleveland, do more coronary angioplasties and insert more stents than any other location in the U.S.--four times more than the national average, three times more than the Cleveland average. They perform even more than the recently-indicted cardiologist in Louisiana, who performed twice the national average of procedures.


The Times article, part of a series about financial incentives in medical care, provides a responsible and incredibly balanced report on the situation in Elyria. I have to give them credit, because from the eyes of a colleague (myself), this looks like blatant and extreme profiteering: "cathing for dollars".

I find it outrageous that this group of cardiologists claims that they have some special insight into heart care that justifies this extraordinary reliance on heart procedures. There's bound to be variation in practice patterns, but this is so outside the norm that I believe criminal behavior will be exposed. In fact, I believe that even the "norm", or average, rate of procedures is also excessive.

This is symptomatic of the perverse equation in heart disease care. If there's money to be made in major heart procedures, who wants to bother with prevention? Programs like the Track Your Plaque program present real potential to stop coronary heart disease in its tracks for many, if not most, participants--but don't expect to hear about it from your cardiologist. Don't expect to hear about it from the increasingly hospital-employed primary care physician.

Hopefully, media exposure like that in the New York Times is just the beginning of a public re-analysis of not only what's wrong with medicine today, but recognition of the tremendous power in preventive strategies when everyone stops being so enamored with hospital-based procedures. CT-based heart scanning that ignites your heart disease prevention program is your way to dodge the mainstream obsession with procedures.

More on "Bio-identical hormones" and Wyeth Pharmaceuticals

18. August 2006 William Davis (0)
In October 2005, Wyeth petitioned the FDA, requesting that it completely ban the bioidentical alternatives that women have been using in ever-increasing numbers to achieve optimal hormone balance. With bioidentical replacement therapy clearly reducing its market share, Wyeth asked the FDA to outlaw all compounded bioidentical hormone formulations that compete with its own discredited drugs. If Wyeth is successful, then menopausal women will have no choice other than to take potentially life-threatening hormone drugs or to forgo hormone replacement therapy altogether, thus enduring the physically and emotionally debilitating effects of menopause-induced hormone depletion.

Dave Tuttle
Life Extension Magazine
August, 2006



For more commentary on Wyeth Pharmaceutical's outrageous and brazen petition to the FDA to bar prescription "bio-identical" hormones, i.e., hormones that are identical to natural human forms, read Life Extension's article, Health Freedom Under Attack!
Drugmaker Seeks to Deny Access to Bioidentical Hormones




This well-researched article is in the August, 2006 issue of Life Extension Magazine. The article can also be accessed online at http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2006/aug2006_cover_attack_01.htm

or go to www.lef.org and click on the August, 2006 issue.

The author, Dave Tuttle, details the baseless arguments raised by Wyeth, a pathetic and amazingly selfish act in the name of protecting profits for Premarin, their prescription agent. It's bad enough to be selling this worthless drug. It's even worse--criminal, in my mind--to try to stamp out our right to have a physician write a prescription for a pharmacy to mix up hormones identical to that humans produce, individualized to our needs.

If you are as angry about this as I am, please go to the Life Extension online reprint that provides access to the International Academy of Compounding Pharmacists website to send the FDA an e-mail describing your opinion, or go to www.iacprx.org.

How accurate is LDL cholesterol?

17. August 2006 William Davis (0)
Watch TV and you'd get the impression that the world revolves around LDL cholesterol: Commercials for Lipitor, Zetia, Vytorin, etc., all drugs to reduce cholesterol (total and LDL). Your doctor looks first and often only at LDL cholesterol.

If there's so much attention paid to LDL, how accurate is it? 100%? 90%? 80%?

Well, it varies widely. Occasionally, it's truly accurate, but most of the time it's miserably inaccurate . Every single day, I see people with LDL cholesterols that underestimates true (measured) LDL by 40%, 50%, and even over 100%. In other words, LDL cholesterol might be 120 mg/dl by the conventional method, but the genuine measured value might be 160 mg/dl, or even 240 mg/dl. It can be that far off--and it's not rare.

The converse can occasionally be true, though rarely in my experience: that conventional LDL overestimates true LDL. I saw someone in the office today like this, with a conventional LDL of 142 mg/dl but a true measured LDL of 115 mg/dl. I may see one or two more people like this the rest of this year.




Why is LDL so inaccurate? Several reasons:

--LDL in most labs is calculated, not measured. The "Friedewald calculation" derives LDL by substracting HDL and triglycerides (divided by 5) from total cholesterol. The higher triglycerides are, especially above 150 mg/dl, the more inaccurate the calculation becomes. As HDL drops below 50 mg/dl, this also introduces greater and greater inaccuracy.

--LDL particles vary in size. A more accurate representation and measure of LDL's dangers are therefore found in measures of LDL particle number , rather than a weight-based measure or calculation. LDL particle number can be measure as just that, LDL particle number (NMR), or as apoprotein B, the protein in LDL that occurs one apoB per LDL.

I liken conventionally calculated LDL cholesterol to a broken speedometer. You simply won't have an accurate measure of how fast you're going, though you may have a ballpark sense. But try telling that to the state patrol.

Or, as a cardiologist colleague said to me in a similar conversation about LDL: "Well, it's better than nothing!"

The lesson: If you're interested in plaque control, and control or reduction of heart scan score, you need a measured LDL, preferably LDL particle number by NMR or an apoprotein B. Another option is "direct" LDL.

Green tea: friend or faux?

15. August 2006 William Davis (0)
The www.HealthCastle.com website is a helpful website on healthy eating that sends out a free newsletter. The content is all produced by licensed dietitions and nutritionists. Although I don't agree with everything said on the site, there's still some good information.

I'm a fan of green tea. Although I believe the effects are relatively modest (weight reduction, cholesterol reduction, anti-oxidation, etc., with theaflavin and/or green tea as a beverage,) they alerted me to the fact that the Lipton Green Tea product is one you should steer clear of. Here are their comments:



"More like Soft drink than Green Tea!With 200 calories, 13 teaspoons of added sugar and a long list of artificial ingredients, Lipton Iced Green Tea is more like a bottle of soft drink than tea, in our opinion."


The Lipton website lists the ingredients:

Water, high fructose corn syrup, citric acid, green tea, sodium hexametaphosphate, ascorbic acid (to protect flavor), honey, natural flavors, phosphoric acid, sodium benzoate (preserves freshness), potassium sorbate (preserves freshness), calcium disodium edta (to protect flavor), caramel color, tallow 5, blue1.

An 8 oz serving yields 21 grams of sugar. If you drink the full 20 oz. bottle (not hard to do!), that yields 52.5 grams of sugar! You will also notice that the second ingredient listed after water is high fructose corn syrup. This ingredient, you may recall, causes triglycerides to skyrocket, causes an insatiable sweet tooth, and is a probable contributor to obesity and diabetes.

In their defense, the Lipton people do also offer a sugar-free alternative without the excessive sweeteners and empty calories.

Do the Lipton products offer the same kind of benefits from green tea catechins (flavonoids) offered by freshly brewed teas? This product has not been formally tested by an independent lab to my knowledge, though, in general, commercially prepared and bottled teas tend to have dramatically less catechin/flavonoid content compared to brewed. (The USDA website provides access to an extraordinary collection of flavonoid food content at their USDA Database for the Flavonoid Content of Selected Foods - 2003. You'll find it at http://www.ars.usda.gov/Services/docs.htm?docid=6231.)

I think the HealthCastle people got it right: Brew your own, making sure to steep for at least 3 minutes. Alternatively, a green tea or theaflavin supplement provides many of the benefits. (Theaflavin has been used in trials at doses of 375 to 900 mg per day.) An in-depth report on green tea will be coming in a future Special Report on the www.cureality.com Membership website.
"Help keep your family goiter free"

"Help keep your family goiter free"

1. May 2009 William Davis (10)
People ask, "If I need iodine, should I go back to iodized salt?"

First of all, how did this notion of iodized salt originate?

In 1924, J. Edgar Hoover was appointed head of the FBI, Marlon Brando and Doris Day were born, and Calvin Coolidge was elected President of the United States. Half of American households had a car, while 1 in 4 Americans were illiterate.



In the 1920s, cities were a fraction of their current size and a third of the U.S. population, or 36 million people, lived in small rural communities.

Goiters were also wildly prevalent in 1924. Up to a third of the population in some areas of the country, particularly the Midwest, suffered from goiters, thyroid glands that enlarged due to lack of iodine.

Goiters were not only unsightly, but sometimes grotesque, causing a visible bulge in the front of the neck. Occasionally, they would grow so big that it compressed adjacent structures, like the trachea, and would have to be surgically removed. Goiters were commonly associated with thyroid dysfunction, especially low thyoid or hypothyroidism, that resulted in low IQ's in schoolchildren, debilitation in adults. Women of childbearing age delivered retarded children.

So iodine deficiency in early 20th century America was a big problem. How to solve this enormous public health problem in a large nation without television, few radios, no internet, with a largely rural and often illiterate population?

Thus was iodized salt born, a simple, technologically available solution that could be implemented on a large scale nationwide at low cost. The FDA chose this route in 1924, figuring that it was the best way to ensure that most Americans could obtain sufficient iodine through liberal use of iodized salt. Public health officials urged Americans to use salt. Morton's salt label proudly bore the slogan "Help keep your family goiter free!"

It worked. Goiters largely became a thing of the past.

How about today? The American Heart Association recommends limiting salt, recently announcing that they would like to limit intake to 1500 mg per day. The American Medical Association has been lobbying the FDA to set lower salt limit guidelines. The FDA has been clamping down on food manufacturers to reduce the quantity of salt in processed foods.

Why limit salt? The concern is that there are segments of the population (not all) that are salt sensitive, particularly African Americans, people with certain genetic forms of high blood pressure, conditions that cause water retention, and any degree of heart or kidney failure. Salt in these peoplem, in fact, can be disastrous.
So adding iodine to salt was the solution to epidemic goiter. And it worked.

But salt is not a perfect solution, just one that served its purpose back in 1924. What we need is a 21st century solution.
You will find that in the various iodine supplements at your health food store. My favorite is kelp--inexpensive, available, and a form that mimics the way Japanese people obtain iodine (though by eating seaweed, rather than with tablets).


Image of kelp courtesy Wikipedia
Tags :

Comments (10) -

  • Anna

    5/1/2009 3:44:00 PM |

    I hadn't used iodized salt in more than 15 years.  In recent years I have only purchased various sea salts, usually as unrefined as possible.  There are traces of iodine in unrefined sea salts, but probably not enough.

    I've also heard that another cause of lowered iodine intake in recent years is a decline in the use of  iodine-based disinfectants when cleaning food manufacturing machines and equipment.  Traces of residual iodine would go into the food during processing, apparently.  Not sure what disinfectants are used instead now.

    So I also have increasingly incorporated kelp into my cooking and seasoning.  I began with sprinkling kelp granules on our morning eggs with a bit of sea salt and ground black pepper, for instance, or adding kelp granules to homemade vinaigrettes, salad dressings, and sauces.  It sort of looks like medium grind black pepper, but without the spiciness.  

    Additionally, I keep a jar of Ao Nori Flakes (natural sea vegetables) in my seasoning cupboard and I use it liberally like one might use finely chopped parsley or chives to add a bit of green garnish in soups, mashed cauliflower, etc.  No one even needs to know it's sea vegetables instead of minced parsley, if you catch my drift.

    Toasted nori is a great snack, and can be cut or torn up to use as wrappers or platforms for other foods.   Kids often love nori, especially if introduced at a young age.  

    Some specialty grocery stores (such as Whole Foods or ethnic markets) may stock fresh sea vegetables in the chill case (often stocked with fresh chilled pickles and raw sauerkraut).  The sea vegetables are packaged with salt crystals for longer storage, but the salt should be rinsed off before using.  Sea vegetables make a great salad accompaniment to seafood or sashimi, but if that's too exotic, try tossing just a small amount of chopped colorful sea vegetable into an ordinary tossed salad at first to get used to the soft-crunchy  texture (sort of like a good traditional raw sauerkraut's texture).  

    Last, but not least, dried seaweed/sea vegetable kombu is very good for adding iodine to broths.  These larger dried sea leaves keep very well in a cupboard for a long time, and are easy to toss into simmering water to create a delicious, nutritious broth for seafood  recipes.  The kombu leaves are removed and discarded after the broth is made.

    More information about how to use kelp, nori, sea vegetable, and kombu is easy to find online, too (the WAPF website www.westonaprice.org  is also a good resource).  Using these items regularly in your cooking adds a delicious slightly savory accent as well as iodine and other trace nutrients to your diet.  Strange as "seaweed" might seem at first, only the fresh sea vegetables and nori will even be noticed by your family members, and even nori isn't so exotic with the rise in familiarity with sushi and sushi-like rolls.   The kelp granules, flaked dried sea vegetable, and kombu can be your secret if necessary  Wink.

    Nori and kelp granules can be often be found with the Asian foods on the international or ethnic aisle of conventional grocery stores. Kelp granules are sometimes stocked with spices, herbs, and seasonings, too.  More variety of choices may be found at specialty grocers.  I like the Ohsawa brand (Japanese, family-owned, traditionally prepared foods, distributed in the US by Gold Mine Natural Food Co. of San Diego - no affiliation to either company-just a customer).

    Kelp can also be taken in tablets or gelatin capsules for those who wish to take more or not use it in cooking.  That form of kelp is usually stocked in vitamin and supplement departments.

  • Dr. William Davis

    5/1/2009 4:59:00 PM |

    Wow!

    Thanks for the great advice, Anna.

    My mother was Japanese, so I can tell you that I, too, find it easy to add a variety of seaweed products to meals. I'm impressed with your seaweed enthusiasm!

  • Marisa

    5/1/2009 7:30:00 PM |

    Thank you Anna for all that information!  I have been trying to incorporate more kelp and sea vegetables into our family's diet - but for another reason.  Many autism-boards believe that algin found in seaweed chelates heavy metals, and it's also been suggested that kelp will battle the strep virus.  Although our family's experience is anecdotal, we are seeing tremendous grounds with our child.  She wouldn't eat the kelp tablets (in gelatin form), but readily makes her own dipping sauce for boiled eggs (mixing wheat-free soy sauce with kelp granules and Gomasio - sesame seeds mixed with sea vegetables).  There is also a liquid-kelp form I got when we were exposed to the strep virus; I put a dropper-ful into a shot of juice.

    I am so excited that there are people like Anna who is living the life and willing to share, and Dr. Davis who is putting himself out there and sharing this information.  18 mos ago I didn't know that heart disease was reversible.  And I was exhausted caring for a child that was mildly on the the spectrum.  Now, through radically changing our diets (including supplementation), not only is my health on the up-and-up, but my child is recovered and says and does amazing things.

    From the bottom of my heart I thank you.  - M

  • Anonymous

    5/1/2009 9:03:00 PM |

    Great post on Iodine.

    How much Iodine is safe and how much should be taken daily?

    Thanks!!!

  • Trinkwasser

    5/22/2009 12:08:06 PM |

    Big thanks to Anna from over here in the UK too. In Wales we have Laver bread made from seaweed and here on the east coast we get samphire (glasswort) which is like saline asparagus but has a short season (damn, I'm drooling now!)

    Following your post I've discovered a source of different sea vegetables and (dried) seaweed with which I'm currently experimenting. Tasty stuff!

  • Sherrie

    5/27/2009 12:23:55 AM |

    My doctor has me take it in liquid form, I buy it here in Australia from a compounding chemist and it contains important minerals for thyroid health each 5ml dose has 15mg zinc, 100mcg chromium, 100mcg
    selenium, 150mcg molybdenum, 100mcg iodine, 2.5mg manganese, 2mg boron. Doesn't taste the nicest in juice though Smile

  • michael

    6/28/2009 6:45:37 PM |

    Many thanks for your advice Anna, I am very interested in alternative health.

  • Anonymous

    7/31/2009 2:56:24 AM |

    I was surprised to learn that food processors use plain salt without iodine.

  • Anonymous

    4/10/2010 1:59:25 PM |

    Been eating sea veggies, cereal grains, vegggies, etc since the late 70's, along with occasional wild foods (I live in rural area). I began with the Macrobiotic way of life, and have morphed it to suit my needs, as well, that diet has made important evolutionary steps over the decades. I have recently incorporated fish oil, due to my medittranean heritage, i.e. hyperlipdemia, so my hdl's are 39, my ldl's 135, and tri's 80, cholesterol 198. I suspect fish oil (using Now foods Molecularly Distilled 4k-6k IU's) with intake of 5-6 days a week, ought to improve the next blood report stats.

    Here is a site I use, for sea vegatbles.

    http://www.seaveg.com

  • buy jeans

    11/3/2010 10:22:09 PM |

    So iodine deficiency in early 20th century America was a big problem. How to solve this enormous public health problem in a large nation without television, few radios, no internet, with a largely rural and often illiterate population?

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