Stop trying to lower
your cholesterol

What’s your risk for heart disease? No, I don’t mean “how high is your cholesterol?” Your risk for having a heart attack is not equal to your cholesterol level. In fact, cholesterol is only a small risk factor for heart disease. I’ve been saying for years that there are better ways to evaluate your heart health than to merely look at your cholesterol levels. Now a new study out of the Michigan Medical School has come to the same conclusion. And it suggests that relying on a statin to prevent heart attacks doesn’t make sense.

For years, conventional medicine has told us that the lower our cholesterol the better. This is a myth perpetrated by pharmaceutical companies. And they’ve made a fortune selling cholesterol-lowering drugs. I’ve said this before in numerous articles available on my website. But the solution is not more statins, but fewer.

That’s because very low cholesterol can be a sign of a compromised immune system. And using drugs like statins to reduce cholesterol levels can result in side effects. And they won’t give you the protection you expect. Rodney A. Hayward, MD, one of the study’s authors, and a professor of internal medicine, says you probably don’t need to take statins. He explains that “if your LDL (“bad”) cholesterol is high, but your overall cardiac risk is low, taking a statin does not make sense for you.”

Instead, these researchers found that other factors are more predictive than cholesterol in assessing risk. These factors include age, family history of heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, smoking, and C-reactive protein. I agree. But I would add fibrinogen levels, diet, nutritional and hormonal deficiencies, and a lack of exercise as additional risk factors.

What’s more, these factors will lead you to a better treatment protocol. For instance, if your blood pressure is high, a new heart tonic, Circutol, can dramatically drop blood pressure levels.

And since statins affect inflammation inside blood vessels — and this inflammation is what causes heart attacks and strokes — many people who take statins may not need them at all. They could lower their risk by taking anti-inflammatory nutritional supplements, such as Reduloxin, and by eating an anti-inflammatory diet.

Whatever you do, don’t believe all the hype surrounding low cholesterol levels, statins, and heart attacks. As you can see from this study, cholesterol is only a small part of the problem. And artificially lowering it too far can cause serious health problems.

Your voice of reason for women's health,

Dr. Nan

PS. Both Circutol and Reduloxin are available from Advanced Bionutritionals. For more tips on reducing inflammation and blood pressure, and lowering your risk for heart disease and other chronic illnesses, read my past articles on the subject available to all newsletter subscribers.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/176401.php.