The Cholesterol Hypothesis is not true

 

Borrowed this AM from Dr. Malcolm Kendrick's blog

 

Here is the introduction to the chapter on cholesterol and mortality:

All-cause mortality is the most appropriate outcome to use when investigating risk factors for life threatening disease. Section 1 discusses all-cause mortality according to cholesterol levels, as determined by large epidemiological studies in Japan. Overall, an inverse trend is found between all-cause mortality and total (or low density lipoprotein [LDL]) cholesterol levels: mortality is highest in the lowest cholesterol group without exception. If limited to elderly people, this trend is universal. As discussed in Section 2, elderly people with the highest cholesterol levels have the highest survival rates irrespective of where they live in the world.

I don’t think that I really need to say anything else, other than to repeat this fact. If you have a high cholesterol (LDL) level, you will live longer. This is especially true of the elderly.

Interesting Article about eating organic

This article is interesting in that it tracks pesticide residues in people who ate organic for two weeks
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/14/the-organic-effect_n_7244000.html

If you're not growing your own, it might pay to get organic produce especially of those items that show up on the "Dirty Dozen" list every year. 

"What I discovered about Selenium Supplements"

I started supplementing selenium when diagnosed with fibrocystic breast disease, and the selenium was the cure.  It might be more accurate to say that the disease was a deficiency of selenium. Rather inadvertently I discovered that selenium dramatically improved carpal tunnel as well.  The brand of Selenium I was taking was Life Extension and the form of selenium was two forms:

Se-methyl L-selenocysteine and L-selenomethionine.  It was combined with Vitamin E.

When I ran out I got a different brand and took those for a couple months or more, but noticed the carpal tunnel symptoms were  back slightly.  I no longer have that bottle so I don't know what form it was but it did not have Vitamin E. 

I recently went back to the original brand and type and have seen fairly noticeable improvement in carpal tunnel in about a week or ten days.  I can't say for sure why, but if you want my recommendation, I'd suggest Life Extension brand with the two forms of selenium and Vitamin E. 

On the same note, there is a lot of really worthless fish oil capsules on the market.  For the purists, you might want to try Vital Choice Wild Alaskan Sockeye Salmon Oil, look it up on Amazon and read the reviews.  I have not tried it.  A little spendy for me.  I use Carlson's brand Norwegian Salmon oil.  OK, it's not straight salmon oil.  Their salmon is farmed.  But the quality is good, there is benefit from their product and it's affordable to me.  I have tried many brands over the years and many are a waste of money.  Real Omega 3's are actually effective at reducing inflammation and so reduce pain. Better than aspirin. Carlson's delivers and I choose not to be a purist on this item.

I'd like to hear from any of you who have tried good or bad supplements.  

More Information on Vitamin D

This next quote I think is important.  Our culture--in terms of politics, nutrition and other areas--thrives on promoting fear.  You will hear dire warnings about too much Vitamin D (and other things).  The following is a breath of sanity.

 

 "The evidence is clear that vitamin D toxicity is one of the rarest medical conditions and is typically due to intentional or inadvertent intake of extremely high doses," writes Hollick, a professor of medicine, physiology and biophysics at Boston University School of Medicine.

 

ANd as far as what's a good level, some are recommending 20 as within the normal range.  Bit when studies test levels of Vitamin D in the blood of peoples who live in the sun, we probably get a better idea of what's normal.  So here are two.

 

Many of us have been waiting years for this data. To me, it means that the Vitamin D Council’s recommendation of 50 ng/ml is just about right, although I cannot argue with someone who recommends a level of 55 ng/ml. Remember, when errors in measuring vitamin D are made, they usually are overestimates. Thus, if mean natural levels are around 45 ng/ml, keeping your level around 50-55 ng/ml keeps you within what both the Maasai and the Hadzabe are telling us.

 

AND:

We measured the sum of serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D₂ and D₃ (25(OH)D) concentrations of thirty-five pastoral Maasai (34 (SD 10) years, 43 % male) and twenty-five Hadzabe hunter-gatherers (35 (SD 12) years, 84 % male) living in Tanzania. They have skin type VI, have a moderate degree of clothing, spend the major part of the day outdoors, but avoid direct exposure to sunlight when possible. Their 25(OH)D concentrations were measured by liquid chromatography-MS/MS. The mean serum 25(OH)D concentrations of Maasai and Hadzabe were 119 (range 58-167) and 109 (range 71-171) nmol/l, respectively. Br J Nutr

Also there is evidence that aging per se does not cause poorer conversion of sunlight to Vitamin D, but rather that as people spend less time in the sun they begin to lose the ability to convert sunlight to Vitamin D.   Use it or lose it, apparently.  A good question to ask is if that ability can be restored with more sun exposure.  So far I can't find an answer.

CHOLINE

I’ve been harping on minerals, especially in terms of what prevents cancer.  I stand by the information.  More looking at research is just more convincing.  You probably are low in some or most that I have discussed unless you are supplementing or have a very unusual source of produce and protein.  The nutrient I want to talk about today is choline, sort of in the family of B Vitamins.  And btw, a deficiency of this nutrient may play a role in causing liver cancer.  But it has far reaching effects that I want to touch on.  Another btw, it’s pronounced Coline. 

Here is a list of the things the research indicates (just cut and pasted from numerous sites): 

·         Choline is positively associated with specific cognitive functions, namely verbal memory and visual memory.

·         A choline deficiency can greatly impair your memory and reasoning functions while also making it harder to focus and even affecting your mood.

·         structural integrity and fluidity of neuronal membranes

·         Lower levels may be associated with inattention, difficulty remembering new information and recalling stored memories, diminished mental energy and the characteristic sensation of “brain fog”.

·         Anti-inflammatory

·         Helps to prevent certain birth defects, such as spina bifida

·         May help you run the final miles of your marathon at a faster-than-usual pace.  Athletes have also been known to use Choline to give them an edge in sports performance. This is normally for the purpose of delaying the onset of fatigue. Endurance athletes benefit greatly, as do weight lifters and body builders looking to perform extra reps before their muscles fill with lactic acid.

·         Able to prevent fat from accumulating in the liver. Autopsies and ultrasound studies have shown that up to 75% of the obese and 70-85% of type 2 diabetics have fatty livers. And the low-profile but essential nutrient choline appears to provide the solution to the problem

·         May be useful to limit neurologic damage in stroke patients and improve retinal function in some glaucoma patients, maybe in dementia and head trauma cases as well.

·         Using Choline to lose weight is a proven, effective technique.

·         Helps reverse insulin resistance

 The last two are particularly of interest to me and I have recently started supplementing with choline.  I will report later. 

The Importance of Minerals

First of all, I have a correction.  I went back over old blog posts and realized I mis-spoke mathematically about how much selenium I took.  At most I was taking 600 mcg and then dropped that amount to 400.  The upper safe limit is 600 per day and more is not likely to help and may hurt.   I am currently looking into what difference the form of selenium supplement makes and will report.  Also, it needs to be taken with some Vitamin E as they work together.

I've run into information recently that zinc also plays a role in cancer prevention--probably other health issues.  Bottom line, all the minerals are extraordinarily important for our long term wellness.  I'd like to find a mineral supplement that is good.  All formulations I've so far looked at, are heavy on calcium and low on magnesium for a start.  We need at least as much magnesium per day as calcium, and a glass of milk is 300 mg of calcium.  If you drink milk, that Ca needs to be factored in.  None of the formulation I've looked at, has anything close to enough iodine or selenium, either, considering that nearly everyone is dangerously low in those.

Vitamins matter.  But vitamins are fairly easy to get.  Because they are so depleted in soils, I can almost guarantee you are low in many minerals and they matter big time.  They are extremely critical to all body processes, all the chemical reactions that constitute the complexity of our biology.

Miscellaneous Research

Today’s post is a collection of things I’ve run into in research that I think are interesting and useful information in terms of wellness and aging.  I will give you a plain explanation first then cut and paste from the research.

 

1)  Since we’ve been talking about cancer, this first is about cancer.  The Warburg effect is the discovery that cancer only feeds on glucose.  Unlike your muscles which can switch to another fuel, cancer cells cannot.  This research found that short term fasting kills cancer cells.  It does so by depriving them of a way to generate energy for cell activities.  This is up and coming research and we’ll be hearing more about it.

 

Fasting induces anti-warburg effect that increases respiration but reduces ATP-synthesis to promote apoptosis in colon cancer models

 

These findings indicate that the glucose and amino acid deficiency conditions imposed by STS (short term starvation) promote an anti-Warburg effect characterized by increased oxygen consumption but failure to generate ATP, resulting in oxidative damage and apoptosis.

 

2)  This one brings up our old friend inflammation.  Parkinson’s is another autoimmune disease where the immune system is cranked into high gear, then attacks its own tissues.

 

New link between neurodegenerative diseases, abnormal immune responses found

 

New insight into the link between neurodegenerative disorders and inflammation has been gained by a new study that provides a framework to explore more fully the possibility that viral infection may lead to onset of these diseases.

 

3)  This one is easy to understand. 

 

Exercise largely absent from US medical school curriculum, study shows

 

Fewer than half of the physicians trained in the United States in 2013 received formal education or training on the subject of exercise, according to new research. "There are immense medical benefits to exercise; it can help as much as medicine to address some health concerns," said a national expert on the benefits of physical activity. "Because exercise has medicinal as well as other benefits, I was surprised that medical schools didn't spend more time on it."

4)  If you are insulin resistant…and the only way to really know is a fasting insulin test (not glucose)…this is very important information.  BTW, most people I know—even some thin ones are insulin resistant.  I was really pleased with what I learned about selenium and iodine, but magnesium is every bit as critical if not more so.  Like all minerals, if it’s not in the soil it doesn’t get into the plants. 

I go in for blood work next week and will have more to say about what minerals have done for me.  But one unexpected result of adding magnesium supplements is that of reduced incidence of getting up in the night to use the bathroom.  That’s a biggie for it means my sleep is better.

 

This study basically says that magnesium can prevent the transition from insulin resistance to type II diabetes because it reduces insulin resistance.  Take some.

 

Oral magnesium supplementation reduces insulin resistance in non-diabetic subjects - a double-blind, placebo-controlled, randomized trial.

       Abstract

The incidence of insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome correlates with the availability of magnesium (Mg). We studied the effect of oral Mg supplementation on insulin sensitivity and other characteristics of the metabolic syndrome in normomagnesemic, overweight, insulin resistant, non-diabetic subjects.. The results provide significant evidence that oral Mg supplementation improves insulin sensitivity even in normomagnesemic, overweight, non-diabetic subjects emphasizing the need for an early optimization of Mg status to prevent insulin resistance and subsequently type 2 diabetes.

 

5)  Along the same lines, the following from Diabetes Care, is self explanatory

 

In a 2011 controlled trial, vitamin K2 supplementation improved insulin sensitivity.

 

To summarize, we have demonstrated for the first time that vitamin K2 supplementation for 4 weeks increased insulin sensitivity in healthy young men.