Are high concentrations of LDL-cholesterol a major cause of heart disease? If we are a proponent of the “lipid hypothesis,” we say yes. If we are a “cholesterol skeptic,” we say no — total cholesterol, LDL-cholesterol, LDL particles, triglycerides, and other blood lipids have little or nothing to do with heart disease. I believe both of these positions …
by Chris Masterjohn Not much, simply because the data are so poor. However, let’s take a look at some data for the very weakly supported hypothesis that people in the 19th century with familial hypercholesterolemia lived longer than other people and perform a little “thought experiment” to see what it could teach us about genetics if …
In my last two posts, I argued for the importance of distinguishing the lipid hypothesis, which holds that high concentrations of cholesterol in the blood cause heart disease, from the diet-heart hypothesis, which holds that high amounts of saturated fat in the diet cause heart disease. If you missed them, you can read them here: The Proper …
In my last post (The Proper Use of the Term “Lipid Hypothesis”), I traced the origin of the term “lipid hypothesis” to Edward Ahrens in 1976, who defined it as the hypothesis that reductions in blood cholesterol levels will lead to reductions in heart disease risk. This can be seen as a testable prediction of …
There seems to be a lot of confusion about the meaning of the term “lipid hypothesis” in pop science books, blogs, and other places. Often times, the lipid hypothesis is confused with the diet-heart hypothesis. The two are very different. The lipid hypothesis concerns the role of lipids in the blood. The diet-heart hypothesis concerns …
by Chris Masterjohn New blog over at WestonAPrice.Org about how a nourishing diet may sometimes increase blood lipids by curing somone of fatty liver disease: Why Is My Cholesterol So High On This Diet? Read more about Chris Masterjohn, PhD, here.
by Chris Masterjohn I was happy to see last night that the two letters to the editor I’ve written about vitamin E have been cited recently. I’m sad that another recent paper did not cite my letter about why their drug might be killing people, which we’ll get to below. The first letter was published in the …
Those of you who have spent much time perusing my web site know that cholesterol is the limiting factor for the formation of synapses, connections between neurons that form the basis of learning and memory. In fact, one of the reasons we learn better when we get enough sleep is because the brain ramps up …
After the Coronary Primary Prevention Trial, fittingly published in 1984, showed that cholestyramine, a drug that lowers cholesterol by causing its conversion to bile acids, could reduce the risk of heart attacks, cholesterol was widely villainized as a killer. From then on, the decades-old campaign of the American Heart Association against eggs and butter was …
Last weekend I was invited to speak at the Freedom Law School’s 2009 Health and Freedom Conference, which was an interesting mix of nutrition and politics, the latter portion largely devoted to opposition to the income tax, opposition to the Federal Reserve, and alternative theories about what happened on September 11, 2001. I don’t agree …