Thread: 7 Factors to Consider if You're Told Your Cholesterol Is Too High

7 Factors to Consider if You're Told Your Cholesterol Is Too High

By Dr. Mercola

When I first opened my medical practice in the mid-80s, cholesterol, and the fear of having too high a level was rarely discussed unless your cholesterol level was over 330 or so.

Over the years, however, cholesterol became a household word for something you must keep as low as possible, or suffer the consequences. Today, dietary fat and cholesterol are typically still portrayed as the worst foods you can consume.

This is unfortunate, as these myths are actually harming your health.1 Cholesterol is one of the most important molecules in your body; indispensable for the building of cells and for producing stress and sex hormones, as well as vitamin D.

Since the cholesterol hypothesis is false, this also means that the recommended therapies—low-fat, low-cholesterol diet, and cholesterol lowering medications—are doing more harm than good.

Statin treatment, for example, is largely harmful, costly, and has transformed millions of people into patients whose health is being adversely impacted by the drug. As noted by Dr. Frank Lipman in the featured article:2

"[T]he medical profession is obsessed with lowering your cholesterol because of misguided theories about cholesterol and heart disease.

Why would we want to lower it when the research3 actually shows that three-quarters of people having a first heart attack have normal cholesterol levels, and when data over 30 years from the well-known Framingham Heart Study4 showed that in most age groups, high cholesterol wasn't associated with more deaths?

In fact, for older people, deaths were more common with low cholesterol. The research is clear – statins are being prescribed based on an incorrect hypothesis, and they are not harmless."

In his article, Dr. Lipman discusses seven things you need to know when you have a talk with your doctor about your cholesterol level. For starters, it's important to realize that the conventional view that cholesterol causes heart disease was based on seriously flawed research right from the start.

#1: Flawed Cholesterol Science Has Done Untold Harm...

This includes Dr. Ancel Keys' 1953 Seven Countries Study,5 which linked the consumption of dietary fat to coronary heart disease. When Keys published his analysis that claimed to prove this link, he selectively included information from only seven countries, despite having data from 22 countries at his disposal.

The studies he excluded were those that did not fit with his preconceived hypothesis. Once the data from all 22 countries is analyzed, the correlation vanishes. Moreover, as noted by Dr. Lipman:

"[T]oday's mainstream thinking on cholesterol is largely based on an influential but flawed 1960s study which concluded that men who ate a lot of meat and dairy had high levels of cholesterol and of heart disease.

This interpretation took root, giving rise to what became the prevailing wisdom of the last 40+ years: lay off saturated fats and your cholesterol levels and heart disease risk will drop.

This helped set off the stampede to create low-fat/no-fat Frankenfoods in the lab and launch the multibillion-dollar cholesterol-lowering drug business in hopes of reducing heart disease risk. Did it work? No.

Instead of making people healthier, we've wound up with an obesity and diabetes epidemic that will wind up driving up rates of heart disease – hardly the result we were hoping for."

#2: Cholesterol Is Important for Health

Cholesterol, a soft, waxy substance, is found not only in your bloodstream but also in every cell in your body, where it helps to produce cell membranes, hormones (including the sex hormones testosterone, progesterone, and estrogen), and bile acids that help you digest fat.

It's also important for the production of vitamin D, which is vital for optimal health. When sunlight strikes your bare skin, the cholesterol in your skin is converted into vitamin D. It also serves as insulation for your nerve cells.

Cholesterol is also important for brain health, and helps with the formation of your memories. Low levels of HDL cholesterol has been linked to memory loss and Alzheimer's disease, and may also increase your risk of depression, stroke, violent behavior, and suicide.

#3: Total Cholesterol Tells You Virtually Nothing About Your Health Risk

Your liver makes about three-quarters or more of your body's cholesterol, which can be divided into two types:

High-density lipoprotein or HDL: This is known as the "good" cholesterol, which may actually help prevent heart disease.
Low-density lipoprotein or LDL: This "bad" cholesterol circulates in your blood and, according to conventional thinking, may build up in your arteries, forming plaque that makes your arteries narrow and less flexible (atherosclerosis). If a clot forms in one of these narrowed arteries leading to your heart or brain, a heart attack or stroke may result.

Having defined those two types of cholesterol, it's worth noting that there's really only one kind of cholesterol, as previously explained by Dr. Ron Rosedale below. (Video at link)

Read more:
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/ar...ol-levels.aspx

Originally Posted by A.J.

7 Factors to Consider if You're Told Your Cholesterol Is Too High

Here are 7 factors that prevent sickness and disease from coming on me...

Romans 8:11
But if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you (allowed to live in us), He that raised up Jesus Christ from the dead shall also quicken (energize, make alive) your mortal body by His Spirit that lives in you.

1 Peter 2:24
Jesus carried our sins in his own body on the cross, so that we, being dead to sin, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes you were healed.

Matthew 8:17
That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses.

Isaiah 53:4,5
Jesus has carried our grief (pain, anxiety, calamity, disease, sickness), and carried our sorrows (anguish, affliction, feelings of pain, sadness and sorrow): yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted....but He was wounded (to wound, to break, be slain or killed) for our transgressions, He was bruised (crush, destroy, oppress, to collapse) for our iniquities: the punishment (violence, rebuke) of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed. (He took our wounds, so we could take his wholeness & health in every area of life)

Proverbs 4:20-23
Attend to My words; incline your ear unto My sayings....let them not depart from your eyes; keep them in the midst of your heart....for they are life unto those that find them, and health to all their flesh....keep your heart with all diligence; for out of it flow the forces of life.

James 5:15
The prayer of faith shall save the sick (from being sick!)

Exodus 23:24-26
You shall not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do their works: but you shall utterly overthrow them, and destroy their images.
And you shall serve Adonai your God, and He shall bless your food and drink; and I will take sickness away from the midst of you.
There shall nothing cast their young, nor be barren, in thy land: and you will live out the full span of your lives.

Good article, thanks AJ!

Yeah, I like Mercola. I get his email every day.