How can I cut my "cholesterol

[Christine]

Any opinions on peanuts, cashews or almonds? Are any of these good for lowering cholesterol? Or do they raise cholesterol?

Can you take the flax seed in a pill form?

I don't really have any information on the nuts. I think they can help but only one ounce per day, dry roasted or raw, etc.

As for the flax oil--I take flax oil in pill form but I am taking it for dry skin and a dry eye condition. If you want to take flax for your heart, I believe the best way to do it is to use the ground flax seed in your cereal, yogurt, etc. It's got the fiber in it (much like oatmeal) that helps break up cholesterol.

Now if you want to take supplements, the *current* literature for "heart healthy" is fish oil supplements. I believe they are finding these to be very beneficial. Again, a good brand is Nordic Naturals or Carlson's. Although, Carlson's isn't as easy to find and my not come in a capsule.

 

[chrissyk]

I've been taking the EFA (Essential Fatty Acid) softgels from Trader Joe's daily for a couple of years now. They have brought my triglycerides into the normal range (they were WAY high before), but they haven't done anything for my LDL or HDL. At least they help with the triglycerides, though. This is a "fish oil" suppliment.

 

[clarabelle]

The company Hodgson Mill has products made with flax seed and other whole grains. They are on the internet and in grocery stores

 

[funhouse8]

Any opinions on peanuts, cashews or almonds? Are any of these good for lowering cholesterol? Or do they raise cholesterol?

Can you take the flax seed in a pill form?

You can take the flax seed in a pill form but you need alot of it to make up for the fresh flax seed. The best way to go is grind it yourself and next the oil. I think you have to take something like 5 pills to equal the same. If you want to eat nuts a good choice is soy nuts. They have been proven to help lower the levels. Good luck.

Oh maybe a banana dance might bring down your Chol level:

 

[Pea-n-Me]

Most Patients Don't Reach Cholesterol Goals

By Peggy Peck
WebMD Medical News


Feb. 28, 2000 (Cleveland) -- High cholesterol -- especially too much LDL-C, the so-called bad cholesterol -- is a known risk factor for heart disease, but a new study suggests that most people who are treated for high cholesterol fail to lower it enough to meet target levels.

Researchers from the study, called the Lipid Treatment Assessment Project (L-TAP), say that only 38% of the 4,888 people they studied achieved their goal cholesterol levels. This is a troubling finding, they suggest, since the study was designed to track the effectiveness of treatments by physicians in the community. When researchers test drugs in the controlled environment of clinical trials, the results are often impressive, but critics maintain that those results may not be reproducible in the everyday clinical setting.

"I think it's an educational thing. We've just got to keep educating doctors," Joseph S. Alpert, MD, tells WebMD. "It just takes time to get people to do it. We have the same problem with other diseases." Alpert, who heads the department of medicine at the University of Arizona Health Sciences Center, was not involved in the study.

The researchers, led by Thomas A. Pearson, MD, PhD, of the University of Rochester School of Medicine, had the same concern. Writing in the Archives of Internal Medicine, they conclude that more aggressive treatment of high cholesterol is needed to reach the goals established in guidelines set by the National Cholesterol Education Program (NCEP).

The study supported by a research grant from the Parke-Davis pharmaceutical company of Morris Plains, N.J., looked at patients who were undergoing treatment by 619 primary care physicians. The patients, aged 20-75, were treated with either lipid-lowering drug therapy or diet. Investigators divided patients into three groups: Low-risk patients, who had no evidence of coronary heart disease (CHD) and fewer than two risk factors for it; high-risk patients, with two or more risk factors and no evidence of heart disease; and patients who actually had heart disease. Risk factors included age (45 or older for men and 55 or older for women), family history of heart disease, cigarette smoking, hypertension, and diabetes.

Only 38.4% of patients in the study achieved their target levels of LDL-C. The success rate was highest among the low-risk group (68%), followed by patients in the high-risk group (37%), and was lowest among patients with CHD (18%), the researchers write. Among those in the high-risk group, the more risk factors a patient had, the more successful treatment was.

"When you have an effective therapy, those who are most severely affected are going to benefit the most," Alpert says.

Another finding was the link between diet and success. Although only 34% of the 751 patients who were treated with diet instead of drug therapy achieved the target LDL-C level, "compliance with diet still contributed to LDL-C lowering and remained a significant predictor of success," the researchers write. This could be interpreted to mean that patients who comply with diet guidelines might also be more compliant with medication, they say.

"You are picking out people who are going to comply. A person who ignores the diet might also be someone who forgets to take their medicines," Alpert tells WebMD.

The authors suggest that an explanation for the poor results could be the lower-key approach of primary care physicians, who may not be as aggressive as investigators in clinical trials. For example, few primary care physicians used high doses of lipid-lowering drugs. The researchers conclude that the only way to meet the NCEP objectives is to use more drug therapy when diet alone fails to lower cholesterol, to concentrate on statin drugs, and to increase doses to achieve target levels.

Alpert tells WebMD, "Patients should participate in their own care. The NCEP project puts those numbers out there. These are the numbers you should be at. If you're not there, you should push your doctors. As always in these situations, you need to take some responsibility of your own health."

The NCEP guidelines for LDL-C levels may be found on this page: http://rover.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/public/heart/chol/fabc

Most people who seek treatment for high cholesterol levels don't lower cholesterol enough to meet target levels, according to a study in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
Patients' diets contributed to lowering of LDL-C levels, which could mean those who comply with diet guidelines might also be more compliant with medication.
Researchers suggest that cholesterol treatment needs to be more aggressive so more patients can achieve their target cholesterol levels.

 

[mcnuss]

Many knew they had high cholesterol levels and either made some half hearted attempts to lower them through diet (which often fall to the wayside) or just ignored them saying they heard that cholesterol medications were bad for you or they didn't want to have to take a medication. So sad. What could possibly have been prevented or delayed is now a full blown problem. When one has a cardiac event they are automatically put on cholesterol lowering agents since studies have shown they improve survival. We see this all the time.

Pea-n-Me - Here's my problem with the rush to medicate, despite the fact that you are completely correct that most people are unable/unwilling to make the dietary changes necessary to reduce their C levels, there is no research that shows that these meds do anything to prevent a first-time cardiac event, in fact, the last time I looked into the research, there is still no good research showing that the meds prevent subsequent cardiac events. I belive, however, that it is good medicine to use them after the first event, just in case they do help, it has not been proven. And given the controversy over the new drug classes, I can understand people's reluctance.

The key here is early education and intervention. As adults, it's our obligation to change our diets for ourselves and for our kids. We are creating an entire generation of kids who do not know how to make good food choices, and who view healthy foods as some kind of punishment. We load ourselves up on convenience foods that are full of chemicals and trans-fats, and we wonder why we are fat and sick!

 

[Julia Roberts]

Opps!

 

[Christine]

Pea-n-Me - Here's my problem with the rush to medicate, despite the fact that you are completely correct that most people are unable/unwilling to make the dietary changes necessary to reduce their C levels, there is no research that shows that these meds do anything to prevent a first-time cardiac event, in fact, the last time I looked into the research, there is still no good research showing that the meds prevent subsequent cardiac events. I belive, however, that it is good medicine to use them after the first event, just in case they do help, it has not been proven. And given the controversy over the new drug classes, I can understand people's reluctance.

The key here is early education and intervention. As adults, it's our obligation to change our diets for ourselves and for our kids. We are creating an entire generation of kids who do not know how to make good food choices, and who view healthy foods as some kind of punishment. We load ourselves up on convenience foods that are full of chemicals and trans-fats, and we wonder why we are fat and sick!

ITA!! I believe in medication truly as a last resort. And I *do* believe that there are those people out there that their only answer is medication. I also strongly believe that most of the people, though, can do it by diet adjustment.

The statin drugs that they are using now seem to be doing a lot of good. My only hang up of these would be--is this what you want to do the rest of your life?? Remember, one day you are not going to be working, going to elderly, and be on Social Security and/or Medicaid. You can't keep taking a pill for everything, it's going to EAT UP your retirement money!

 

[mcnuss]

ITA!! I believe in medication truly as a last resort. And I *do* believe that there are those people out there that their only answer is medication. I also strongly believe that most of the people, though, can do it by diet adjustment.

The statin drugs that they are using now seem to be doing a lot of good. My only hang up of these would be--is this what you want to do the rest of your life?? Remember, one day you are not going to be working, going to elderly, and be on Social Security and/or Medicaid. You can't keep taking a pill for everything, it's going to EAT UP your retirement money!

It's going to eat up the whole country's retirement money!

We are a pill-popping society bc we always want immediate results. We are not, as a society, very good at looking at long-term effects or ramifications. We seem to think that there's a miracle cure for everything, especially, it seems, the things we have brought on ourselves, like obesity.

I saw something on TV once that has stuck with me for years. There was a doctor on GMA or one of those shows talking about weight loss. The interviewer was peppering him with questions about all the different plans, surgeries, pills, etc... He said that you can try all of those things, but the secret to weight loss could be summed up in 4 words: "Eat better, move more". Should be all of our mantras!

Cholesterol is more complex than that, of course. It's not always weight related. My mom, who at 5' 2" weighs maybe 125 and who is very active, was at 245 at one point. My dad, who has struggled with his weight all his life, has never topped 175. Go figure.

 

[Planogirl]

I know what you mean about the pill-popping problem. It's not just the patients either but doctors seem to really buy into that.

I avoided my personal physician when I had a bad cold last month because her solution to everything is to throw drugs at it. With my BP problems and so on, I was at one point taking so many drugs that I felt really miserable and how can that be a good thing? I'm working on my own to improve my health and searching for hopefully a less pill-happy doctor.

I'm just one person. How many people out there are swallowing drugs by the handfulls rather than trying to improve their health through other means first? I wonder how many of those who take something for high cholesterol tried to control it on their own first?

 

[Pea-n-Me]

Pea-n-Me - Here's my problem with the rush to medicate, despite the fact that you are completely correct that most people are unable/unwilling to make the dietary changes necessary to reduce their C levels, there is no research that shows that these meds do anything to prevent a first-time cardiac event, in fact, the last time I looked into the research, there is still no good research showing that the meds prevent subsequent cardiac events. I belive, however, that it is good medicine to use them after the first event, just in case they do help, it has not been proven. And given the controversy over the new drug classes, I can understand people's reluctance.

First of all, I knew when I posted the information I did that there were going to be people here who took exception to what I had to say. That's fine, people are free to do whatever they want to do.

However, I wanted to share MY experiences in one of our country's finest cardiac centers with patients who've had heart attacks, having worked closely for the past 18 years with this population of patients. I sit at the bedsides attempting to educate many, many patients who are shocked and overwhelmed they've had a heart attack and feeling kind of sorry they didn't take this information more seriously when they had the chance (again, MY experience). I'll reiterate: many have known they've had high lipid panels for many years and have not gotten those values down successfully for whatever reason.

Seeing that this thread has already had 629 hits I am hoping the information I've shared will help at least one person who currently has a high lipid panel, even if others like yourself consider what I've said to be "rushing to medicate".

As far as your claim as research showing cholesterol lowering agents do not prevent either primary or secondary cardiac events, this is simply not true. There is an overabundance of research showing just the opposite. (BTW, most patients have no problem taking the drugs after an event, they know how important it is at that point and don't want to have further heart damage).

So sorry you don't agree, but that's your right. I am not going to argue about it with you or anyone else. I hope I've helped at least one person who may be reading this.

Cardiovascular Disease Experts Comment on Cholesterol-lowering Research

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ANAHEIM, Calif.-- Leading cardiovascular experts from around the world Wednesday issued the following comments regarding the West of Scotland study, the latest research on aggressive cholesterol-lowering in people at high risk for heart disease, following a presentation at the American Heart Association annual meeting:

Terje R. Pedersen, M.D., coordinator of the Scandinavian Simvastatin Survival Study

"This study has major implications for clinical practice, the start of treating high cholesterol in the same dimension as treating hypertension today. The results of the West of Scotland (WOS) study confirm what we observed in the Scandinavian Simavastatin Survival Study, that cholesterol-lowering is of substantial value in reducing the risk of coronary heart disease. These benefits are not isolated to the agent used in the WOS trial."

J. Sanford Schwartz, M.D., executive director of the Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics at the University of Pennsylvania

"The WOS study is an important study for several reasons. First it confirms and extends previous findings on the impact of cholesterol-lowering on cardiac morbidity and overall mortality. Prior to WOS there have been other trials that showed that if you take patients who have elevated cholesterol and who are at risk coronary heart disease and lower their cholesterol level you can reduce heart attacks and deaths from coronary heart disease.

"Last year 4S demonstrated that in addition to reducing in cardiac morbidity and cardiac mortality, you also get significant increases in overall survival. WOS confirms and extends those findings beyond patients who have coronary heart disease to people with elevated cholesterol and multiple risk factors for heart disease.

"What was demonstrated in 4S and has been demonstrated in the trials is the greater the extent of cholesterol lowering that is achieved the greater the benefit. The National Cholesterol Education Program guidelines recommend treating to goal -- driving cholesterol down to 100 mg/dl in patients with CHD.

"The WOS results that have been made available thus far do not report what level these patients got down to, but they do report a 26 percent reduction in LDL cholesterol. Based on previous trials, one would expect that those patients who achieve a greater reduction in LDL cholesterol will achieve a greater benefit.

"If that's true, that would suggest that drugs that are more effective in lowering cholesterol, like simvastatin, will have an even greater impact. In 4S LDL cholesterol was reduced by 35 percent, as compared to WOS where LDL cholesterol was reduced by 26 percent.

"Most experts believe that these are primarily class effects and that they are a result of primarily if not solely LDL reduction. All the data suggests that the more effectively you lower LDL , the more benefit you'll see. There is no reason to believe that this is only restricted to the drug that was used in WOS.

"My take away for clinicians is that we now have two very well designed, very well run, large randomized clinical trials in the last two years that provide us with rock solid evidence that in patients with elevated cholesterol that have either CHD or multiple risk factors that lowering cholesterol aggressively with statins reduces cardiac mortality, cardiac morbidity and it reduces overall mortality. And therefore, the controversy which is surrounding this area, with these clear results, should really be put to rest.

Suzanne Oparil, professor of medicine at the University of Alabama at Birmingham

"This is a dramatic study. We learned last year from the 4S study that lipid lowering with a statin drug lowers coronary disease mortality, lowers the incidence of non-fatal heart attack, does not adversely affect non-coronary mortality, and therefore, decreased all cause mortality dramatically. Other findings were the need for hospitalizations decreased, the need for revascularization decreased, and cardiovascular endpoints of all causes such as sudden death decreased.

"The 4S study was done in individuals who already had heart attacks -- 92% of them already had heart attacks, the others had angina. One thing the 4S study had that the West of Scotland doesn t is women, and the women seemed to benefit as much as the men, although there were smaller numbers there.

"In the West of Scotland Study, only men were looked at who did not have established myocardial infarction, pre-existing myocardial infarction, and it was shown that lowering cholesterol with pravastatin, which is another statin agent, decreased non-fatal MI or cardiovascular death, coronary heart disease death, by 31% which is a pretty dramatic effect. This was accomplished by lowering total cholesterol by 20% and LDL cholesterol by 26%.

"We believe that the beneficial effects of the statins are related to the cholesterol lowering, there is no evidence for another mechanism although another mechanism has not been ruled out. And it s reasonable to extrapolate that if the cholesterol had been lowered further, that the benefit might have been greater.

"The clinical implications are if you are a man, and you have a high cholesterol level, you probably should be on a cholesterol-lowering agent and at present the statins seem to be the best tolerated of the cholesterol-lowering agents.

"In the literature, cholesterol-lowering with other agents such as resins, has not decreased all cause mortality, suggesting that this may be due to increases in non-cardiovascular mortality with some of the other classes of drugs.

"Statins seem to do nothing adversarial, at least in a high-risk population over a five year follow-up. No major adverse affects were seen with either of the statins over this period of time, which is quite impressive.

"I believe in vigorous cholesterol-lowering with medication. I think one very convincing piece of evidence to practitioners, particularly non-cardiologists, is that cholesterol-lowering does have a beneficial effect in the prevention of fatal cardiovascular events. It should extend the use of these agents (statins) to patients who have very high risk because they have very high cholesterol levels, but have not had heart attacks.

"Since these results are so similar to the results that were seen in the 4S study, they are somewhat less dramatic in that the magnitude of the savings of life and the prevention of MI was smaller and the extent to which cholesterol was lowered was less, it seems that this is a class effect.

"Since meta-analyses have shown that the magnitude of benefit from HMG-CoA reductase treatment, or statin treatment, seems to be proportionate to cholesterol-lowering, one would wish to use high doses, or the most potent agent available. This is a class effect.

"The development of atherosclerotic disease is gradual. The benefit of pravastatin in the West of Scotland is that after six months of treatment there was a statistically significant benefit. That means those men getting benefits from the treatment had established advanced atherosclerotic disease already, which was manifested by a heart attack or death within the first six months of treatment."

Scott Grundy, M.D., director and chairman, Center for Human Nutrition, The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas

"WOS is one more study that shows that cholesterol-lowering is highly effective for preventing CHD and its complications. This study has to be taken as one of several important studies done recently, and it is particularly in line with the 4S trial, which was a secondary prevention trial that showed if you lower LDL cholesterol, dramatic reduction in coronary in recurrent coronary events follows.

"This trial was a primary prevention trial and similar results were obtained. So I think this is confirmation that dramatic cholesterol-lowering with the statin drugs will significantly reduce coronary events whether in the secondary prevention setting or in the primary prevention setting. The most urgency is for patients in secondary prevention, people who have established coronary disease: they should have their cholesterol lowered, but also high risk patients are candidates for cholesterol lowering drugs.

"The greater the cholesterol lowering the greater the reduction in clinical events. This is been shown by taking all the trials and putting the results together. The more recent trials with the statin drugs, we can lower cholesterol much better than with older drugs, and get much better results.

 

[Christine]

Pea-N-Me: I hope you don't think I'm refuting what you said. I think there is a place for both POVs here. I know that when my father had high cholesterol, the first thing his GP did was throw the statin drug at him. He did take it for about a year and he just did not like some of the side effects of it. He decided that he would give his diet a very good try. He got off the statin and then he and my mom did some version of South Beach and walked for 3 miles 5 times a week. He was able to get his cholesterol down from 238 to about 190. I do know that there are people who cannot and that the drugs are lifesavers. But I also know a handful of people in my own personal circle who are the drugs and make NO attempt to modify their diet. That's where I take exception.

This coming from a Prilosec, Ibuprofen, Synthroid, Xanax-popping DISer!!

 

[snappy]

I have seen the benefit my 75 year old mother has reaped from Lipitor. She is a very informed dieter, eats a good deal of fruits and veggies, very seldom eats red meat. She has exercised three times a week for many years, doing a complete cardio workout, still had a problem with her cholesterol levels. She has dramatically improved her ratio after one year of Lipitor. Her doc was practically jumping up and down when he saw her results.

I think you can try with diet and exercise alone for a specified time, if it does not work, try the meds. Too much to lose not to.

 

[SlightlyGoofy]

Please pardon me if I repeat something already said. Is late and I am headed to bed.

My skinny hubby developed high cholesterol after he retired. Myself, big as a small house, has great chol.

I started giving him oatmeal for breakfast. My unprofessional opinion is that oatmeal does not lower cholesterol as much as cutting out bacon and eggs and eating oatmeal instead does.

I did some research and found that OJ, not from concentrate, helped cholesterol levels so he started drinking a glass or two of that a day.

I also happened to read an article that linked high caffeine intake with high cholesterol so I got him to give up his 30-40 cups (yes, you read that right) of coffee.

He dropped over 30 points by doing this combination of things.

We will not talk about the morning that I caught him adding a half a stick of butter to his oatmeal. He still does not understand why that was wrong.

I have loads of favorite ways to prepare oatmeal. I only like the old fashioned kind myself. My favorite way is to add a package of sugar free hot cocoa mix to it for a nice chocolate start to the day. Diced apple and some Splenda and cinnamon is good too. Unlimited possibilities and if you truly only like the processed oatmeal you can toss the whole grain kind in a processor for a few seconds and avoid the unfriendly extras that the boxed kind has.

Slightly Goofy

 

[Pea-n-Me]

Christine, I understand what you are saying and I respect your POV (as always ). I certainly am all for people making positive changes in their dietary habits and in fact teach that very thing myself. I just wanted to make people aware that dietary changes alone may not be enough.

I'm glad your father was able to successfully lower his cholesterol panel. I don't know what his medical history is but if it includes a family history of heart disease or he has other risk factors like hypertension, obesity, smoking, sedentary lifestyle, previous coronary artery disease, etc, I would understand why his GP would want to be as aggressive as possible. As I said before, most people we see are not able to do what your father has done.

In the last article I quoted you'll see that the greatest benefit in patients with coronary heart disease was found in patients who had lowered their cholesterol to 100mg/dl - that's pretty low and would be next to impossible to achieve without medication. However, lowering it significantly with diet and exercise alone is always a good thing and if that's the route people choose to go then that's ok. As a society I think we really are making small strides. Admittedly we have a long way to go but most people have at least an awareness of what and how they should be eating.

 

[nativetxn]

My husband lowered his cholesterol and triglycerides by giving up sugar and white flour.

 

[grlpwrd]

Bumping this thread... as I was just given a blood test last week and my cholesterol level is really high. My mom takes Lipitor and I didn't even think about my cholesterol being bad as I think I eat right. Then again my mom's side has high cholesterol and other health problems.

I really thought I was "healthy." I eat brown rice daily and all the "good" foods and I exercise.

PSA for today... y'all get checked!

 

[Laurajean1014]

Oatmeal, Green Tea and I like "Take Control" olive oil spread. It takes great and melts well on stuff.

Good luck!

 

[bimshire]

I was just told it is a little high and my "GOOD" is too low....what is good to eat and do to lower it>>??? I am a 43 year old female. In decent shape?

Eat at home and prepare balanced meals in adequate portions. Exercise daily.

 

[Rajah]

Thanks for this thread. I'm not positive, but I suspect mine is just a fraction high (it was heading that way last time I tested) and I keep trying to find something I'll stick to for diet changes. No luck yet, but some of those oatmeal recipes sound pretty good.

My problem with oatmeal (well, true, it's the instant packets) is I'm *hungry* again after just an hour or so. If I have a good breakfast sandwich or burrito, I can go 4 hours before having to eat something for lunch. Anyone else have that problem?