BS: some good news on cholesterol

Subject: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 05:55 PM

I only heard about this in the last few days on a TV documentary....perhaps someof you have seen references earlier...It involves a small group of Italians who have passed a mutation down for several hundred years. Basically, there have been clinical trials which astounded researchers...perhaps there is real relief in the future.

"Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have discovered the mechanism by which an extremely rare protein mutation shields people from cardiovascular disease. The discovery could lead to more potent drug therapies that target both cholesterol deposition and prevent future accumulation. Results were reported in the February 12, 2002, issue of the journal Biochemistry.

more at this link

slightly more technical article here

some VERY technical articles available if you wish to delve into it. A search on "Italian gene cholesterol" or "ApoA-I Milano" will get you days of reading.

like this

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: GUEST,Skipy
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 06:52 PM

I like fat birds, £ for £ they are better value!
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 07:00 PM

*sigh*

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 07:15 PM

Ye Gods, I must be worth a fortune, but you can have high cholesterol without being overweight... similarly you can be overweight but not have a problem with cholesterol.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: Mary in Kentucky
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 07:16 PM

Thanks Bill, I hadn't heard about this. I almost pursued biochemistry in my youth, but preferred physical chemistry instead. (I didn't like the sight of blood.) Now I wish I had a better understanding of genetics since that is where so much active research is now.

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: heric
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 07:30 PM

My cousin has been a lean long distance runner all of his life. Recently, in his early fifties, he decided that old joints can't take so much, so he dropped his running to an hour per day (plus an hour of walking.) Never smoked, eats healthy, all that. He knew he had high cholesterol but didn't take drugs for it, preferring diet and exercise, with his doc's concurrence. Two days ago, at the finish line of a half marathon, he had a heart attack at age 54.

Main arteries were 90% (ninety per cent) occluded. This has turned my view of the world upside down.

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 08:43 PM

"Eats healthy" can mean just about anything. What I mean is, you can find someone with a qualification saying that just about any food stuff you care to mention, in just about any combination, is good for you.

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: heric
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 10:09 PM

I'd always believed, though, that if you had a good cardio program in place, you could eat whatever the heck you chose. Since dieting is out of the question, I happen to have a treadmill on order, placed just before this incident. Now I feel like just upping my life insurance and forgetting the whole bleeding subject.

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 11:22 PM

Sadly, one of the implications of understanding this new genetic information is that most of us today cannot ignore cholesterol just because we exercise. Some bodies just do not process things as well as others.
   Since the race never needed to be thin and live to be 92 in order to reproduce, there was no particular selection for a gene of this type, and it is pure chance that it was discovered at all. Gaining weight may have even been a partial survival trait in days when food was scarce and we got lots of exercise anyway!...at least we survived long enough to have kids!

I have always been lucky and stayed thin and had VERY good cholesterol and thought I'd never have to worry, but recently I was told I had 'moderate' elevation in 'bad' cholesterol. The doc said that *I* needed to exercise more, so at age 65, I am starting a separate exercise program for the first time in my life.
......boy, if this therapy WERE widely available today, my wonderful Italian wife, Ferrara, could once again eat more of the food she grew up loving!

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: GUEST,MBSLynne
Date: 18 Mar 05 - 03:45 AM

I've just (very reluctantly) started taking a statin drug to lower my cholesterol since the doctor says that my life-style can't really be improved on enough to lower it that way. I am not overweight,I excercise regularly and I eat a very healthy diet. The sad fact is that my liver produces too much cholesterol....no way round it at the moment but to take statin, which, I believe, stimulates an enzyme in the liver to deal with the excess production of cholesterol.

Love Lynne

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 18 Mar 05 - 04:44 AM

I am about to start taking it too. I suggested I try an even healthier diet than now (I thought it was a healthy diet I was eating) and increasing my exercise, but was told the drug would be the only way......The joys of ageing..
Best wishes.

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 18 Mar 05 - 05:47 AM

My diet is appallingly bad.. lots of butter, eggs, meat (which is why I liked the Atkins diet so much), but during 2 years of investigations into a dicky ticker, not one doc suggested my cholesterol was high or bad. Judging by the ease they managed to get various bits of metalwork and ironmongery up into my heart, the arteries and veins aren't particularly furry.

And yes, I'm overweight, don't excercise much, eat the wrong things... go figure!

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: Bev and Jerry
Date: 18 Mar 05 - 04:17 PM

For many people, LDL (bad cholesterol) is directly related to weight but for some it's not. Jerry's doc believes that you could measure your LDL, have liposuction, and measure it again and, for most people, there would be a dramatic reduction. Over the past six months, Jerry lost 9 pounds and his LDL dropped 20 pecent.

HDL (good cholesterol) is related to excercise for most people but, again, for some it's not. There is some recent evidence that fish oil (which contains omega-3 fatty acids) increases HDL in a lot of people. You can get it by eating certain kinds of fish like tuna, mackrel, salmon and some others several times a week. Also, you can buy it in capsules very cheaply and get it that way. Jerry has just started taking the capsules and we'll know if it helped in six months. With this and a little more weight loss he may be able to get off the statin drug.

Bev and Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 19 Mar 05 - 02:07 PM

What I'm not clear about is whether "good cholesterol" is actually good for you, or just less bad.

So, does "fish oil (which contains omega-3 fatty acids) increases HDL in a lot of people" - mean, it increases the amount of HDL in you, and that's a good thing; or is it a matter of it increasing the proportion of your cholesterol that is HDL rather than LDL, but ideally you'd want to keep both down?

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: Bev and Jerry
Date: 19 Mar 05 - 03:00 PM

HDL is good for you. In general, the higher the number the less chance you have of developing heart disease. When Jerry's total cholesterol dropped, so did both the LDL and HDL components. Lowering the LDL decreases the chances of developing heart disease but lowering the HDL increases the chances. Fish oil is (hopefully) a way to increase HDL without increasing LDL. So is exercise but he's much more likely to take the fish oil than to increase his exercise.

Bev and Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: bobad
Date: 19 Mar 05 - 11:15 PM

McG of H

When a value for cholesterol is given it is known as total cholesterol which is the composite of HDL, LDL and a few other sterol esters such as VLDL, Lipoprotein A etc. which all add up to a value commonly referred to as cholesterol. I hope this provides some clarification to you.

b

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Mar 05 - 07:16 PM

So "total cholesterol" is made up of stuff where having a high value is good, together with stuff where having a high value is bad, and they then get added together.

Very strange. A bit like adding the score made by two sides in a game. But what you want to know is, who won the match...

Subject: RE: BS: some good news on cholesterol
From: Ferrara
Date: 20 Mar 05 - 11:26 PM

Sigh.... It will probably be at least a decade before there's any effective treatment based on the gene described in the article. But it may eventually make life a lot more enjoyable for thousands of people. As a heart transplant patient I have to limit my diet in terms of the three biggest sources of flavor: fat, salt & sugar. Ah well. It's like old age ... consider the alternative.

It's often hard to get one's doctors to order a "full lipid profile" rather than just a cholesterol count. I have to remind them every darned time. Total cholesterol is a rough indicator of how you stand, but the amount of HDL, LDL and triglycerides is pretty important too.

My HDL and LDL have both gone up since I started taking fish oil for other reasons 3 years ago. My triglycerides (the other thing they measure in cholesterol) have dropped dramatically and are below the "normal" range. This seems to be good news as long as they don't go too low.

The Berkeley Wellness Center on-line says "It's well known that omega-3s help lower triglycerides." At the same time, some sites say fish oil can raise LDL. Taking garlic oil may counteract that. I've tried it. Who knows if it helped or not? My LDL is still higher than it used to be.

It's all a complex subject and there are an awful lot of factors. You have to be your own medical researcher to some extent.

For those of you who are taking statins: research indicates that statins lower the amount of "Co-Enzyme Q-10" your body produces. It's an important enzyme for the heart and for all muscle tissue. Some doctors now recommend Q-10 supplements to patients who take statins. Others "don't believe in" Co-Enzyme Q-10. I'm not sure whether they think it doesn't really exist in people's bodies, or just that supplementation never makes a difference. It can and (sometimes) does. If you start feeling tired after being on statins a while, you might want to look into it.

Rita F