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If an apple a day keeps the doctor away, what would it take to avoid a heart surgeon? How about a multivitamin / mineral pill and some omega-3 oil (canola-rapeseed, flax, fish)? Add a diet low in processed food and a good 'lifestyle' (don't smoke, manage stress well, some exercise) and you will improve general health and help prevent heart disease. We all believe we're eating a good (enough) diet but even the best diet does not have the vitamin levels that our bodies and genome developed on. Supplementation fixes this, and is safe, cheap and easy.
Science shows that a heart healthy diet is one with relatively unprocessed foods with veggies and some fruits, and rice or grains that retain some of their original kernel-structure to slow digestion. Such 'whole' foods became scarce in Western diets. If you can't recognize part of the original food, the item is processed or refined. Some eggs, liver or fish are probably also vital for most of us.
Why a add multi-vitamin pill to your diet? Well, most fast single nutrient diseases like scurvy, beriberi and goiter were wiped out by food fortification, our 'weapon of mass nutrition'. However, processed foods low in many nutrients such as vitamins B6, B12, folic acid and others, cause 'Long-Latency Deficiency Diseases', such as heart disease, cancer, bone loss and Alzheimer's. Think of these as nutrient deficiency diseases with long incubation periods and the science suddenly makes sense! Start with cholesterol and the science will never makes sense (can your doctor explain the 6th figure from the bottom?).
Even in health, there's excellent science for taking such [normally, no-iron] multi plus foods and supplements for a total daily intake of at least 1 gram vitamin C, about 1 g calcium, 600 mg magnesium, 2000 IU (50 mcg) or up to 6000 IU D (from the sun--when your shadow is shorter than your height), about 100-200 IU vitamin E in a meal with fat and 200 mcg selenium [bench-mark of a great multi.]
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  A good multi is a zero calorie Essential Food Group, Ounce Of Prevention and Nutritional Seat-Belt. There is no research showing that avoiding vitamins makes you healthier and it's the only easy life-style change you can make. This website may not make you smoke less, walk more or revolutionize your diet but these ideas are simple and benefits major. This website takes you from the not-so-bad cholesterol via fats and vitamins to the tastier foods; it is a free 86 page book in PDF [needs free Acrobat] without the 'cholesterol page' PDF. Home page only. The next page has the essentials but do visit the last page. This site is for your well being so input is appreciated. |
CHOLESTEROL you asked? Likely a protective factor, not a risk factor prior to refined foods while the famed Framingham study found clearer thinking with higher cholesterol and
decreasing levels after age 50 predicting more heart disease deaths!
Cholesterol Pills, statins like Lipitor, Zocor, Pravachol, Lescol, Mevacor or Crestor, (killer) fibrates and niacin (mega vitamin B3) have side effects, good, bad and unknown.
The more statins cut cholesterol, the more they cut energy to nerves, muscle and heart by lowering CoQ10, 'battery acid' and anti-oxidant ('catalytic converter') of every cell. Here's a study with best cholesterol in the old 'normal' range of 180-240 (4.6-6.0) -also: 1,
2 and the 3rd to last picture on this page. More: thincs.org and Cholesterol Myths.
The U.S. "powers that be" in 2015: "cholesterol is no longer a nutrient of concern." ..
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 More cancer and no survival benefit (±0.1%) in high risk older Europeans: Lancet 2002 (3 million $3 pills taken). Next, in 6 years, nobody saved (±0.07%) in this younger group of 5170 Americans. |
PS-1 In heart failure: lowest 20% for cholesterol: double the death rate! PS-2 Lipitor's TNT trial implodes: 5000 heart patients for 5 years on 80 mg top-dose suffer 2 more deaths than patients on only 10 mg. On either dose, the same 26 ±1% progression in artery calcium in 12 months anyhow! Lipitor does NOT save lives in studies.  PS-3 Out of 1/2 million U.S. men at 'prime heart attack age', the top for cholesterol [292 mg/dL (7.5 mM)] on anti-cholesterol absorbing drug for 7.4 years (and 1/8th less 'bad LDL' compared with dummy drug) but no difference in survivors; count them: 3. And, oeps: in 65,000 men with 2700 deaths, those with least cholesterol [below 187 (4.8)] had most deaths!
 PS-4 The American College of Cardiology in 2004: "... there is no evidence for a total mortality benefit in women from dyslipidemia [statin] treatment." Women: 3 more deaths on Zocor and 2 more heart 'events' on Lipitor in large studies (4S, ASCOT). In 24,000 women over age 50, those in the lowest third for cholesterol had the same risk for death (+60%) as those smoking! |
Fever indicates infection but sitting in ice water won't kill the microbe! 'Cholesterol', insulin, sugar and blood pressure are also indicators, think: excess junk carbs, lack of micro-nutrients and artery decline in progress.
Above minimal '6' homocysteine is the indicator for your personal lack of most B vitamins. But unlike cholesterol, homocysteine corrodes (permanently damages) all proteins. It is also a poison pill in cholesterol transporters (LDL droplets), making 'cholesterol' actually become 'bad' -as do trans fat and oxidized cholesterol from foods with egg or milk powder.
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A BMJ study: '..there is still only .. inconclusive [sic] evidence of the effects of modification of total, saturated, mono-unsaturated, or poly-unsaturated fats on cardiovascular [disease and] mortality.' Here's a 2006 JAMA disease summary: the futility of eating 'less fat'. Incidentally, hydrogenation of oils, most industrially refined foods and heart attacks are something of the last 95 years [text for graph]. We explore heart disease as a recent multi nutrient deficiency problem, starting with omega-3 oils, magnesium, folic acid and vitamins B6 and B12.
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  There are no drug deficiency diseases, or 'essential diets', only essential nutrients, yet, per capita, Americans use $70 prescription drugs per month. Most drugs manage lab-numbers or symptoms like pain, not root causes; they don't 'cure'. This is why cholesterol, sugar and blood pressure drugs have such difficulty proving they save lives. Fat plus cholesterol, 'atheroma', in arteries does not happen in wild animals, only in humans, a rare species not making its vitamin C and the only one using cooking, refining and food processing, decimating the nutrients that tame toxic homocysteine. Atheroma is largely a repair gone bad. This site suggests to prevent the injury and control the repair with the 'homocysteine vitamins', omega-3 oils and other nutrients. Many arteries blocked like Bill Clinton: one-year deaths on drugs 1.5% but slightly less drugs with by-pass or angioplasty 4.2%.
Medicine-related deaths in the U.S. may be the 3rd leading cause while nutrients are safe, and cheap. This age old concept is called nutritional, naturopathic or orthomolecular medicine, the human equivalent of fertilizer and healthy soil for plants. |
 
Copyright waived. Founded in 1998 by Eddie Vos, M. Eng., Glen Sutton (Qc) Canada. While based on current science, this site has no final answers or gives medical advice: it helps you think more clearly about nutrition, health and the prevention issue. Changed on
April 23, 2024.
Full site PDF excluding the 'cholesterol' PDF; home page only.
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Bonus: 
