Thread: High cholesterol 'does not cause heart disease'

High cholesterol 'does not cause heart disease' new research finds, so treating with statins a 'waste of time'
Henry Bodkin
13 June 2016

Cholesterol does not cause heart disease in the elderly and trying to reduce it with drugs like statins is a waste of time, an international group of experts has claimed.

A review of research involving nearly 70,000 people found there was no link between what has traditionally been considered "bad" cholesterol and the premature deaths of over 60-year-olds from cardiovascular disease.

Published in the BMJ Open journal, the new study found that 92 percent of people with a high cholesterol level lived longer.
"Lowering cholesterol with medications is a total waste of time"Professor Sherif Sultan, University of Ireland

The authors have called for a re-evaluation of the guidelines for the prevention of cardiovascular disease and atherosclerosis, a hardening and narrowing of the arteries, because "the benefits from statin treatment have been exaggerated".

The results have prompted immediate scepticism from other academics, however, who questioned the paper's balance.

High cholesterol is commonly caused by an unhealthy diet, and eating high levels of saturated fat in particular, as well as smoking.

It is carried in the blood attached to proteins called lipoproteins and has been traditionally linked to cardiovascular diseases such as coronary heart disease, stroke, peripheral arterial disease and aortic disease.



Co-author of the study Dr Malcolm Kendrick, an intermediate care GP, acknowledged the findings would cause controversy but defended them as "robust" and "thoroughly reviewed".

"What we found in our detailed systematic review was that older people with high LDL (low-density lipoprotein) levels, the so-called "bad" cholesterol, lived longer and had less heart disease."

Vascular and endovascular surgery expert Professor Sherif Sultan from the University of Ireland, who also worked on the study, said cholesterol is one of the "most vital" molecules in the body and prevents infection, cancer, muscle pain and other conditions in elderly people.

"Lowering cholesterol with medications for primary cardiovascular prevention in those aged over 60 is a total waste of time and resources, whereas altering your lifestyle is the single most important way to achieve a good quality of life," he said.

Lead author Dr Uffe Ravnskov, a former associate professor of renal medicine at Lund University in Sweden, said there was "no reason" to lower high-LDL-cholesterol.

But Professor Colin Baigent, an epidemiologist at Oxford University, said the new study had "serious weaknesses and, as a consequence, has reached completely the wrong conclusion".

Another skeptic, consultant cardiologist Dr Tim Chico, said he would be more convinced by randomized study where some patients have their cholesterol lowered using a drug, such as a stain, while others receive a placebo.

He said: "There have been several studies that tested whether higher cholesterol increases the risk of heart disease by lowering cholesterol in elderly patients and observing whether this reduces their risk of heart disease.

"These have shown that lowering cholesterol using a drug does reduce the risk of heart disease in the elderly, and I find this more compelling than the data in the current study."

The British Heart Foundation also questioned the new research, pointing out that the link between high LDL cholesterol levels and death in the elderly is harder to detect because, as people get older, more factors determine overall health.

"There is nothing in the current paper to support the author's suggestions that the studies they reviewed cast doubt on the idea that LDL Cholesterol is a major cause of heart disease or that guidelines on LDL reduction in the elderly need re-valuating," a spokesman said.


At a glance | Heart disease

Coronary heart disease (CHD) is caused by the build-up of fatty substances on the walls of the arteries around the heart. The build-up of these fatty deposits make the arteries narrower, restricting the flow of blood to the heart. This process is called atherosclerosis.

This can be caused by a number of lifestyle factors and conditions, including smoking, high cholesterol, high blood pressure and diabetes. Other risk factors include obesity and family history of CHD.

Symptoms can include:

Chest pain - this can be a mild, uncomfortable feeling similar to indigestion.
If the arteries become completely blocked by a build-up of fat it can cause a heart attack
Heart palpitations
Unusual breathlessness

Treating heart disease:

There is no cure for heart disease but treatment can help manage the symptoms and reduce the risk of any further problems. The main treatments are:

Lifestyle changes - more exercise, healthy eating and stopping smoking can help prevent further effects of CHD.
Medicines - they aim to reduce blood pressure and to widen arteries, these include beta-blockers, nitrates and calcium channel blockers.
Surgery - If symptoms cannot be controlled by lifestyle changes or medication there are surgical procedures to open up or bypass blocked arteries.

Source: NHS

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2...esearch-finds/

The statin thing is getting out of hand. They're even talking about putting children on it to decrease the risk of heart disease. Insane.

I actually told my heart doctor I was not going to take them (after a heart cath a few months ago revealed I had a 40% buildup in one artery, less in others). In a nice way he basically called me stupid and childish in my thinking. I went back to my Crossfit (after taking a month off until they did the cath), started declaring the Word over my heart, and went back to my low carb/high fat diet. Fat and cholesterol in and of themselves don't cause heart disease.

We have been fed the 'high cholesterol' thing so much that we have this idea that we have too much cholesterol in our bloodstream, and there's so much it starts sticking to our artery walls. That's not how it works. The cause of the buildup is INFLAMMATION. Inflammation damages the artery walls, and the cholesterol does what it was designed to do, and starts to plug up the damage. It doesn't matter how little cholesterol you have, if your arteries are damaged from inflammation the cholesterol will plug it up. It's repairing the damage. The key is to go after the root cause which is inflammation. And a high carb diet it what basically causes that. Our bodies are over insulinated from eating too many carbs all the time. Cut way back on the carbs and get the insulin out of your system and amazing, healthy things happen to your body.

I've been watching some documentaries about the Drs that came up with all this stuff way back in the day, how they were backed by the government, how the main study by a Dr. who started it all used 7 countries to prove that fat caused heart disease, and left out the other 16 nations that should have been in the study because if you included them all there was no evidence of it. The stuff I've been seeing is downright criminal IMO. So much dishonesty in the whole thing from Drs and the government.

I highly recommend a documentary at the link below called 'Fathead'. Its a documentary (done by a comedian and former health writer) where he goes into a lot of this stuff. It's kinda long but well worth it. Being a comedian he takes kind of a comical approach, which could cause you to not take some of the info seriously, but the stuff he is talking about it dead serious. He also challenges the 'Supersize Me' documentary by Morgan Spurlock (and shows where Morgan may have been a little dishonest in his documentary) and does his own 30 fast food 'diet' and loses 12 pounds eating fast food, then goes another 30 days on a high fat/low carb diet and loses even more with even better vitals. His Dr actually says 'I don't like what you're proving to me here' because it goes against all accepted information put out there.

Anyway I could go on and on about this. Some things in the documentary actually make me mad

One more is 'Cereal Killers' where an athlete goes on a high fat/low carb diet for 28 days and how his vitals and health changed (for the better). I didn't want to buy it so I went to the site and rented it for 30 days for $4.99 I think. Maddening info in there too.

https://vimeo.com/127401963

AJ and Fuego, really good posts. Its hard to believe that statins are still being pushed so hard in light of the volumes of studies that have disproved their effectiveness in most people let alone all the nasty side effects associated with them.

http://livingfaithforum.com/forum/sh...6515#post36515

You actually NEED cholesterol. Take statins - get old (quick).

Originally Posted by fuego

I actually told my heart doctor I was not going to take them (after a heart cath a few months ago revealed I had a 40% buildup in one artery, less in others). In a nice way he basically called me stupid and childish in my thinking. I went back to my Crossfit (after taking a month off until they did the cath), started declaring the Word over my heart, and went back to my low carb/high fat diet. Fat and cholesterol in and of themselves don't cause heart disease.

so...what was the rest of the story? Did your numbers come down?

Originally Posted by Lista

so...what was the rest of the story? Did your numbers come down?

My cholesterol which they did from the blood they took at the time of the heart cath was in the 150s. That's very good. I haven't had it done again since the heart cath which was only 3 months ago.

But back in January of '15 I had a real bad cardiac cat scan report (a score of 1725 where 400 was considered high). I did that on my own apart from a doctor. Emory hospital here has a deal here where you can just go on your own and get it done for I think like $150. I got that bad report and didn't follow up with a doctor. As a matter of fact right after that is when I joined Crossfit, went on basically a very strict vegan diet for a month which I couldn't tolerate, and went back on my LCHF diet.

A year later, about February or March of this year, I decided I wanted to get my medical again for my pilot's license, and decided I needed to take care of this and see how serious it was since I was going to have to report that cardiac cat scan on my application for my pilot's license medical. That's when I went to the heart doctor and he said the only way to really know was the heart cath. So I had that done, worst buildup was 40%, and they didn't put any stents in. They told me I could go back to exercising (when I had gone to the heart doctor, he said with that 1725 score he didn't want me doing anything until they did the heart cath a month later, including not have sex much less do Crossfit That's how serious he considered it, but did say the heart cath could show it's not as bad as the cardiac cat scan showed, which was the case).

Feel free to ask more questions if I left anything out you wanted to know. :)

Originally Posted by fuego

..... he didn't want me doing anything until they did the heart cath a month later, including not have sex much less do Crossfit That's how serious he considered it,

That's bad advice, I wouldn't listen to that

Originally Posted by fuego

...A year later, about February or March of this year, I decided I wanted to get my medical again for my pilot's license, and decided I needed to take care of this and see how serious it was since I was going to have to report that cardiac cat scan on my application for my pilot's license medical...

Did you get the pilot's license yet? You used to do a lot of fasting, do you still do occasional fasts and if so for what length of time?

Originally Posted by krystian

Did you get the pilot's license yet? You used to do a lot of fasting, do you still do occasional fasts and if so for what length of time?

I haven't gone for it yet. A lot of paperwork involved with the medical stuff and just not into it yet.

Haven't been fasting much lately. A couple of weeks ago I did do a Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Monday, with a couple of those like a 500 calorie day and the others just water. I do try to eat all my food in about a 6 hour window or so, so I'm constantly 'fasting' for anywhere from 16-18 hours a day.