Low HDL found risky even if LDL is also low ….
Today's post: Friday, 9-28-2007
On Wednesday, a story came out that I found in the Yahoo online health news Thursday that said research was apparently done by Dr. Philip Barter of the Heart Research Institute in Sydney on 9700 people & reported in the New England Journal of Medicine.
It was thought by many doctors that reducing LDL levels well below 100 would be protective even if the levels of HDL that help clean your arteries is low.
(This is somewhat understandable since those lower levels of LDL do seem protective in the studies done on just LDL.)
Dr Barter was among them.
His data found otherwise.
Low levels of HDL increased heart attack & other cardiovascular risks & did so even in the people he studied with low LDL levels.
Most of the doctors & health experts I’ve read recently have consistently said that their information is that high HDL levels are protective; low levels are quite dangerous; & that your HDL level is much more predictive of heart attack & other cardiovascular risks & your likely longevity than your LDL level.
(For example, high HDL has been found to be predictive of longevity while low LDL has not. And, many doctors already know about the data showing that when a third or more of total cholesterol is HDL the heart attack rate is low, while if it’s a sixth or less, the heart attack rate is high.)
So, it’s nice that the mainstream doctors who tend to not use exercise & supplements in their treatment plans will now see this research.
(FYI: If you haven’t read our previous posts, HDL of 49 or less is low for men & for women before menopause. 39 or less is low for anyone. 60 & above is high.)
Strength training & abundant, vigorous aerobic or cardio exercise raise HDL levels.
Eating junk food including refined grains & a lot of sugar seems to lower HDL. By contrast, eating lots of vegetables & quality protein foods & very little else tends to increase HDL -- & it tends to prevent or reverse being too fat & type II diabetes.
Niacin increases HDL also; but not all doctors know how to use it well. (And, doses of more than 1,000 mg a day of niacin or of 500 mg a day of time-release niacin, can cause liver problems, so they must be monitored with regular blood tests of key liver health indicators by your doctor.)
Quite a large number of supplements raise HDL. (Examples include zinc up to about 50 mg a day though 100 mg or more can lower it; abundant magnesium up to about 600 mg a day from supplements, 200 to 600 micrograms a day of chromium, & the flavonoid containing foods & supplements also do.)
Foods containing high levels of choline raise HDL levels as does the supplement lecithin that contains it. These include wheat germ, liver, & egg yolks. (Since liver from grain fed animals today tends to have high levels of pollutants, it’s not the best source now.)
Extra virgin olive oil helps lower LDL compared with lard, cream, butter, & fatty, grain feed animals. But it leaves your HDL level intact or raises it slightly. By contrast, oils like corn, soy, & safflower oil lower LDL compared with lard, cream, butter, & fatty, grain feed animals but they also LOWER your HDL & tend to increase inflammation which is also a heart risk.
And, one of the most effective ways to raise HDL other than exercise & niacin is by drinking 1 or two drinks a day for men & about half that for most women.
(Drinking more than that actually increases your HDL level more. But it sharply increases the risk of fatal accidents, cancer, & other health problems so much it reliably REDUCES longevity. So stick with the lower amounts !!)
Lastly, smoking & second hand smoke LOWER HDL; & I’ve read they also keep what’s left from being protective. So they lower your effective level of HDL even more than the readings indicate. Ouch !!
Today's post: Friday, 9-28-2007
On Wednesday, a story came out that I found in the Yahoo online health news Thursday that said research was apparently done by Dr. Philip Barter of the Heart Research Institute in Sydney on 9700 people & reported in the New England Journal of Medicine.
It was thought by many doctors that reducing LDL levels well below 100 would be protective even if the levels of HDL that help clean your arteries is low.
(This is somewhat understandable since those lower levels of LDL do seem protective in the studies done on just LDL.)
Dr Barter was among them.
His data found otherwise.
Low levels of HDL increased heart attack & other cardiovascular risks & did so even in the people he studied with low LDL levels.
Most of the doctors & health experts I’ve read recently have consistently said that their information is that high HDL levels are protective; low levels are quite dangerous; & that your HDL level is much more predictive of heart attack & other cardiovascular risks & your likely longevity than your LDL level.
(For example, high HDL has been found to be predictive of longevity while low LDL has not. And, many doctors already know about the data showing that when a third or more of total cholesterol is HDL the heart attack rate is low, while if it’s a sixth or less, the heart attack rate is high.)
So, it’s nice that the mainstream doctors who tend to not use exercise & supplements in their treatment plans will now see this research.
(FYI: If you haven’t read our previous posts, HDL of 49 or less is low for men & for women before menopause. 39 or less is low for anyone. 60 & above is high.)
Strength training & abundant, vigorous aerobic or cardio exercise raise HDL levels.
Eating junk food including refined grains & a lot of sugar seems to lower HDL. By contrast, eating lots of vegetables & quality protein foods & very little else tends to increase HDL -- & it tends to prevent or reverse being too fat & type II diabetes.
Niacin increases HDL also; but not all doctors know how to use it well. (And, doses of more than 1,000 mg a day of niacin or of 500 mg a day of time-release niacin, can cause liver problems, so they must be monitored with regular blood tests of key liver health indicators by your doctor.)
Quite a large number of supplements raise HDL. (Examples include zinc up to about 50 mg a day though 100 mg or more can lower it; abundant magnesium up to about 600 mg a day from supplements, 200 to 600 micrograms a day of chromium, & the flavonoid containing foods & supplements also do.)
Foods containing high levels of choline raise HDL levels as does the supplement lecithin that contains it. These include wheat germ, liver, & egg yolks. (Since liver from grain fed animals today tends to have high levels of pollutants, it’s not the best source now.)
Extra virgin olive oil helps lower LDL compared with lard, cream, butter, & fatty, grain feed animals. But it leaves your HDL level intact or raises it slightly. By contrast, oils like corn, soy, & safflower oil lower LDL compared with lard, cream, butter, & fatty, grain feed animals but they also LOWER your HDL & tend to increase inflammation which is also a heart risk.
And, one of the most effective ways to raise HDL other than exercise & niacin is by drinking 1 or two drinks a day for men & about half that for most women.
(Drinking more than that actually increases your HDL level more. But it sharply increases the risk of fatal accidents, cancer, & other health problems so much it reliably REDUCES longevity. So stick with the lower amounts !!)
Lastly, smoking & second hand smoke LOWER HDL; & I’ve read they also keep what’s left from being protective. So they lower your effective level of HDL even more than the readings indicate. Ouch !!
Labels: HDL, health news, heart attack, heart disease, heart health; Niacin, LDL, preventive medicine
posted by David at 12:56 PM
1 Comments:
Since I wrote this post, I've seen evidence that the fastest AND most protective way to increase HDL is to eat wild caught fish twice a week and take 500 mg a day of the omega 3 DHA.
Besides increasing HDL, doing this lowers triglycerides and inflammation at the same time!
And all that together means that eating wild caught fish twice a week and taking 500 mg a day of the omega 3 DHA dramatically lowers your risk of heart disease.
That's because the two main risks are the ratio between your HDL and triglycerides and HSCRP inflammation.
By boosting both HDL AND lowering triglycerides, your ratio improves a lot -- and in your favor!
In fact this can happen in days! So, I now know it's one of the first things you should do for low HDL.
It's certainly worked for me! My HDL measures 100 and my triglycerides range between 22 & 37. And, my HSCRP is .02.
A man with low HDL and who doesn't do this and does eat wheat and other grains and high fructose corn syrup often (I do NOT!) can easily have HDL of 38 and triglycerides of 228. So his HDL to triglycerides is six to one in the heart attack causing direction!
Mine is about 2 & a half to five to one the other way.
So doing the things to boost HDL and NOT doing the things that boost triglycerides plus taking the DHA and eating wild caught fish has given me 15 to 30 TIMES less heart attack risk than someone doing the reverse!
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