My Total Cholesterol Is 326 And Why I Don't Need To Take Lipitor Or Crestor To Lower It

Of all the blatant lies we have been told about our health over the years, there is one that sticks out as the most egregious of them all because it has failed to be proven by any reputable science or through human experience. And yet millions upon millions of Americans are currently taking a prescription medication for this condition because that's what their doctor told them they needed to do to prevent the risk of heart disease. I'm of course referring to the cholesterol hypothesis.

We've all heard it throughout our lifetime that you better keep your cholesterol below 200 if you want to keep from having clogged arteries which could lead to a heart attack, stroke, or worse. These warnings have come from well-meaning physicians, dietitians, and other so-called health "experts" who are simply regurgitating what they have been taught in medical school, personal training, and from other sources.

One of those "other sources" of information are pharmaceutical companies which stand to profit greatly from a trumped-up condition that they can swoop in and come to the rescue of people with a susceptibility for atherosclerosis with a miracle pill. That's exactly what Pfizer has done marketing Lipitor, Astra-Zeneca with Crestor, and Merck/Schering-Plough with Zetia. These prescription medications are meant to treat "high cholesterol," but has anyone stopped to ask the obvious question that is that gigantic elephant in the room?

WHAT IS THE PROOF THAT HIGH CHOLESTEROL LEADS TO HEART DISEASE?

Surely you jest, Jimmy! Everyone KNOWS that you put yourself at risk when you allow your cholesterol, especially that dastardly LDL "bad" cholesterol, to rise above 200. Anyone who refuses to take a statin drug when their total cholesterol rises above this level is simply putting themselves at severe risk for some rather serious health consequences down the road. Why not just take your medicine like the rest of us are doing and put yourself out of harm's way?

You'd be surprised how many people feel EXACTLY like that. We've been so cleverly sold a bill of goods about cholesterol that it's almost sacrilegious to even suggest a contrary point of view without being looked at like you're some kind of space alien. Of course, those of us who are livin' la vida low-carb are already used to this kind of scrutiny, so what else is new? That said, what is the harm in taking a pill that supposedly will do you some good?

Well, there's PLENTY of harm that can happen. Although cholesterol numbers have come way down from where they once were, what is the cost to our health that these reductions have produced. In my podcast interview with Dr. Jim LaValle last week, he said that if you put 250 people in a room and put them all on a statin drug and just ONE of them reduced their risk of heart disease as a result of this therapy, the pharmaceutical companies believe that is good enough to put the pill on the market for the masses. But what about those other 249 people? What is the impact of a statin drug on THEIR health?!

Let's just be honest for a moment. Cholesterol drugs are about nothing more than one thing and one thing alone: MONEY! If there was no money to be had in reducing cholesterol numbers, then all this hoopla over cholesterol would never even exist. The fact is battling "high cholesterol" is big business and anything that stands in the way of that multi-BILLION dollar profit machine will be run over with a proverbial Mack truck! If word got out that livin' la vida low-carb did more to improve your risk of heart disease than statin drugs, then there would be a lot of unhappy pharmaceutical reps who have made a healthy living selling the facade that "high cholesterol" will kill you.

Let's talk about the pharmaceutical reps for a moment. Who died and made them the great purveyors of health knowledge in the United States? I understand doctors are limited on their time and ability to continue their education into the latest research that comes out about health. But why do the pharmaceutical companies get a free pass to waltz right into see my doctor--sometimes as many as six blaze in and out while I'm there--to explain about their new wonder drug for every ailment known to mankind? Can I have the same sort of privileges to go from doctor's office to doctor's office to give a presentation about the latest scientific evidence supporting a controlled-carb approach on weight and health? I think you know the answer.

So that's the system we're stuck with for now. Doctors go to medical school where they receive a grand total of maybe one week of nutritional education (two if they're lucky!) and then are forced to rely on highly-paid drug company representatives to give them "unbiased" reporting on what they need to be giving their patients for high blood pressure, obesity, and high cholesterol. It's the way we've always done it, so I guess we had better get used to it, right?

Not me. When I decided to go on the Atkins diet in 2004, I was sick and tired (literally!) of settling for the conventional wisdom for what constituted a "healthy" diet and instead chose a way of eating that would help me go on to shed 180 pounds. At the time when I still weighed over 400 pounds, I was taking Crestor after a very painful stint on Lipitor to control my "high cholesterol" which was around 250 at the time. They had me so scared of NOT taking this statin that I felt like it was my only option despite the agonizing pain these drugs have been shown to cause in more users than they even realize.

Nine months later after losing about 140 pounds, I decided to come off of statin drugs for good. And I've refused to take another one since because low-carb has worked better to make me healthier than I ever thought possible. And yet those boo birds in my head kept making a lot of noise in 2006 when I visited my doctor for a routine physical check-up. As soon as my doctor said I needed the "s" word again, I just about screamed! When I politely told him I would NOT be going back on Lipitor or Crestor again, he said he'd give me four months to lower my LDL down from 170 or else he would insist I take it.

When I presented this conundrum to my blog readers at the time, the general consensus was to avoid statins which I then began educating myself more about and learned why LDL and total cholesterol probably aren't as big a deal as they have been made out to be. I learned from people like Dr. Jeff Volek that low-carb cholesterol concerns are unnecessary because the reality is that the HDL/triglyceride ratio is a much better marker for heart health than LDL and total cholesterol. And guess what raises HDL and lowers triglycerides significantly? Yep, it's low-carb, baby! And a low-fat, high-carb diet does just the opposite according to the latest research. DUH!

Once you break through literally years of cholesterol indoctrination and instead challenge those who support the cholesterol hypothesis to prove having "high cholesterol" is unhealthy, then you are then ready to understand that there's more to it than simple terms like "good" and "bad" cholesterol. The particle size of LDL is the BETTER way to determine if that cholesterol number you see is harmful or protective. The large, fluffy LDL are protective while the small, dense LDL particle size is what you need to be wary of. You can check out the particle size of your cholesterol by having a VAP test done or something similar that would give you the breakdown of these cholesterol subsets. It's not as simple as LDL and total cholesterol anymore.

Oh, by the way, do any of these geniuses who put patients on a statin drug also recommend that they take a CoQ10 supplement since this is DEPLETED FROM YOUR BODY when you take one of these drugs? Hmmmm, I guess they just forgot to tell you that! OOPS! Or how about this study which found that having too LOW cholesterol levels leads to depression, suicide, and death? I guess that one slipped their minds, too! Double OOPS! But let's also not forget the evidence that statins can lead to some vivid and vicious nightmares as well. Better make that a triple OOPS!

One of my readers frantically wrote to me an urgent message about their recent trip to the doctor and her diagnosis of "high cholesterol." Here's what she wrote:

Hi Jimmy,

I have been doing Atkins since April 2007 and have lost 40 pounds. I just recently went to my doctor and had some blood work done. I received the results and it came back that my cholesterol is too high. My LDL is around 250, my HDL is around 54 and my total cholesterol is at 300.

I don't know what to do!! My doctor prescribed me Crestor, but I have heard awful things about it. What do you think I should do? I have been eating lean meats, fish and veggies and staying away from excessive salt intake. I don't want to stop doing low-carb. Oh and I am exercising too! I appreciate any help or advice you can give me!!

I'm so glad she wrote to me because she is EXACTLY who I wanted this blog post to be for. She has been sold that bill of goods that her cholesterol is too high and the ONLY answer she has to this grave problem they have presented to her is to take a statin drug. Gee, imagine that! Sure didn't see that one coming!

Let me just say that her HDL of 54 is great and I would be willing to bet her triglycerides are below 100. Dr. Mary C. Vernon has said that one of the surefire ways of knowing someone is low-carbing correctly is their HDL is above 50 and their triglycerides are under 100. If that's the case, then her HDL/triglyceride ratio is FABULOUS and she really has nothing to worry about.

But what about the LDL and total cholesterol? Are they really irrelevant? Well, without seeing the results of her particle size test (which I don't know if they ran or not), it's impossible to know if she's at risk with those numbers. But I do happen to know someone with similar numbers who did have a particle size test done recently--ME!

You'll recall I went to see a low-carb doctor last month about my recent mysterious 30-pound weight gain and he ran my lipid profile numbers for me. When the results came back, they would no doubt be a bit stunning to someone who looks at cholesterol in a traditional way:

Total Cholesterol - 326
Total LDL - 246
Total HDL - 65
Triglycerides - 77
Insulin - 5.8

Yes, my total cholesterol is 326 and hopefully now you know why I don't need to take a statin drug like Lipitor or Crestor to lower it. Check out my HDL/triglyceride ratio. It's virtually 1-1 and that's FANTASTIC! Note that my HDL is above 50 and my triglycerides are below 100--a sign that I'm livin' la vida low-carb 100% right despite my weight gain. So what's up with the LDL? Is the particle size where it needs to be?

The answer is YES! My doctor said that when he analyzed the LDL subset breakdown, he saw a clear majority of the LDL was the large, fluffy kind that you want to protect against cardiovascular problems and very few if any of the small, dense kind. So, despite my astronomical LDL number, it's a non-factor. And neither is the total cholesterol. Keep in mind my HDL "good" cholesterol is high like it needs to be, so that contributes to the total number, too.

So if you've been to the doctor after being on a low-carb diet and you see numbers similar to mine and my reader's cholesterol, don't panic! Get your particle size so you can be armed with the facts about what to do in response. "High cholesterol" is a gimmick to sell more dangerous statin drugs to people who could stand to benefit from the healthy low-carb lifestyle. I'd never tell you what to do for YOUR health--that's YOUR decision. But one thing is for certain. I'm NEVER gonna take a statin drug again!

And I don't have to because I'm livin' la vida low-carb!

'The Statin Effects Study' Spills The Beans On Impact Of Most Popular Cholesterol Treatment

It has been two years since I first blogged about an ongoing study looking at the negative impact of cholesterol-lowering statin drugs (Lipitor, Crestor, and Zocor are the bestselling) conducted by researchers at the University of California at San Diego (UCSD). With literally BILLIONS of dollars spent by patients on each of these drugs annually, are the alleged benefits really worth the pain that so many statin users are reporting?

That's exactly the focus of The Statin Effects Study, led by researcher Dr. Beatrice A. Golomb, and it is the first of its kind to examine and compare actual patient feedback of these FDA-approved drugs on their bodies. With well-publicized concerns in the past over the safety of using such drugs as Vioxx and then the popular diabetes medicine Avandia this week, could removal of these statin drugs from the marketplace be very far behind? It may be coming a lot sooner than later.

Before I started on the Atkins diet in January 2004, I was told by my family doctor to take statin drugs to control my cholesterol. First it was Lipitor which just about killed my joints and muscles to the point that I couldn't take the pain anymore. I pleaded with my doc to give me something else to "lower my cholesterol," so then he switched me to Crestor stating it wouldn't hurt me as bad. Boy was he wrong...it was WORSE! A LOT worse!

In fact, I remember playing basketball at my church one night after losing 100 pounds in early 2004 while still taking Crestor when I went up for a rebound and felt the worst pain I've ever experienced in my thumb. I quickly ran to the sideline and saw my hand swelling up fast (I went to the emergency room where they said I had a deep tissue bruise). All I did was grab the basketball, but the joints in my fingers had become so weak that the impact of gripping the ball caused me to suffer an injury when it probably would not have happened had I not been taking a statin drug.

Sure, statins have been shown to lower your cholesterol numbers, but at what cost to the rest of your health? You've got studies like this one advocating higher and higher doses of statin drugs even in the midst of such nightmarish horror stories from the people who take them.

When I saw a slight increase in my LDL cholesterol last year, my doctor was adamant that I go on a statin drug again. I vehemently refused because I KNEW how they made me feel. So I posed the question to my readers "Do I Statin Or Not?" and the overwhelming conclusion by a consensus opinion was to avoid them at all costs. I was going to anyway, but it was good to see confirmation from my educated peers about this issue.

Because of the negative impact of statins, there are lawsuits being filed against the makers of Lipitor along with several other class action lawsuits from people who have suffered the devastating impact of these medicines that are supposed to be helping our health, not harming it. And yet there is still a lot of confusion and concerns over cholesterol that persists.


Dr. Golomb taking on huge special interests with her statin study

So what are some of the most common negative effects of statin drugs according to Dr. Golomb and her fellow researchers? After sifting through over 4100 response surveys from the people participating in the study so far, here's what they found:

- Most of the "adverse effects" occur in higher doses of statins
- Recurring symptoms happen frequently after the first side effect
- Pain in muscles, trouble remembering things, a tingling, burning, or numbing sensation, and a general sense of irritability are universal reactions to statin drugs
- Other symptoms include mood changes, violent nightmares, liver and stomach problems, trouble breathing, profuse sweating, weight gain, breast enhancement, dry skin, rash, impotence, and blood pressure changes
- Statins also impact protein in the urine, kidney function, and the heart

The researches are quick to point out that all of these symptoms may or may not be directly related to statin drug use, but they are simply what the study participants shared about what was happening to their bodies while taking them.

*We have learned a great deal that helps us to help those who contact us," the researchers said.

The results of The Statin Effects Study have already begun to appear in published form through the American Heart Association, the Archives of Internal Medicine, Controlled Clinical Trials, Annals of Internal Medicine among others. More importantly, the findings have been presented to the doctors who are prescribing these drugs left and right to inform them what they are doing to their supposedly hypercholesterolemic patients. Whether the message is getting through or not is another story.

While the media has picked up on this study, the reporting is, according to the researchers, "not always accurate." Gee, what a surprise there! But the more information that comes out about what these drugs are doing to the health of the people taking them, it will be difficult for the pharmaceutical companies and their buddies in the media to keep sweeping these facts under the proverbial rug!

There are several side studies that have come out of this data, including:

- What impact on memory do statin drugs have?
- Can your body recover from the negative impact of taking statins?
- What should doctors do for patients complaining about pain on statins?

Additionally, they want to continue the information collection process by:

- Creating a survey for family members of statin sufferers to fill out
- Taking an even closer look at the benefits and harm from statins
- Conducting tests on exactly why statins cause the alleged problems
- Examining treatment options for the negative effects of statins
- Continually seeking to publish their study findings in scientific journals

Not one single dime of money for The Statin Effects Study has been collected from the pharmaceutical industry (although it is highly doubtful they would since the results of the study are not looking good for them!), so this research project has been funded by contributions from individuals who care about this subject.

"We believe this is vital to permitting an unbiased evaluation that includes risks as well as benefits of statin use," the researchers contend. "Your contribution, if you wish to make one, will truly make a difference."

If you would like to donate funds to continue financing this study, then please write a check for any amount that you can afford payable to "UC San Diego Foundation, Fund #3923" and send it to:

UCSD Statin Effects Study
9500 Gilman Drive, Dept. 0995
La Jolla, CA 92093-0995

You may also submit any questions, comments, or updates on your own experiences taking statin drugs to the researchers anytime by writing to them at statinstudy@ucsd.edu or by calling (858) 558-4950 ext. 215.

"Furthermore, if you know of someone else who may have experienced benefits or adverse effects on statins, we would be grateful if you might be willing to provide them with our contact information and let them know that their input can be of great help to us," the researchers exclaimed.

Have you taken or are you currently taking statin drugs and experience any specific side effects? If so, then take the online survey RIGHT NOW to share how these dangerous drugs may have harmed you in some way. We have an opportunity to help others who may feel like they have to take statin drugs avoid the pain that so many of us have experienced. I gave them my information two years ago and I was happy to contribute in some small way.

Of course, those of us who are livin' la vida low-carb already know that the supposed cholesterol concerns that we hear so much about are completely bunk because the claims have been greatly exaggerated by the drug companies to make a profit. My challenge back to the people who state that elevated cholesterol levels are bad for you is prove it's unhealthy!

So far, there have been no takers because they KNOW the scientific evidence does not support their position! So why take statin drugs at all? For complete and well-researched details about this topic, you absolutely must read the phenomenal book entitled The Great Cholesterol Con by Anthony Colpo. The TRUTH is there in black and white!

You can e-mail Dr. Beatrice A. Golomb to thank her personally for her fantastic leadership on this statin study at bgolomb@ucsd.edu. We need more people like her willing to take the arrows for the betterment of societal health and well-being. You are to be commended, Dr. Golomb!

5-25-07 UPDATE: Well, I heard from Dr. Golomb today after she read this blog post.

Dear Jimmy Moore,

Thank you so very much for your kind words.

We have, um, been under fire a bit from some quarters this last week so it is wonderful to be reminded that what we are doing is important to the people that matter -- patients!!

Sincerely,

Beatrice Golomb, MD, PhD
Associate Professor of Medicine
UCSD School of Medicine

Oh, I bet you have been "under fire" from the special interests in the pharmaceutical industry that stand to lose BILLIONS of dollars if you keep exposing the TRUTH about what they are doing to the health of real people, or as you describe as "the people that matter -- patients!!" Yep, we are that group of people those in the medical community who support the economic interests of prescription medications like statin drugs have completely forgotten about!

5-26-07 UPDATE: One of my readers wanted to share about a new book she's reading about the corruption of the drug companies that are "selling sickness" to make big profits. Here's what she wrote in an e-mail:

While reading your blog today on the Statin Effects Study, a book I had just finished reading immediately came to mind. Its title is Selling Sickness and was written by Ray Moynihan and Alan Cassels. It is truly phenomenal, and the chapter in the book on "high cholesterol" is eye-opening.

I, too, had been on Crestor and Lipitor and suffered terrible ill effects. After reading this book, I took myself off Lipitor immediately. A portion of the blurb on the inside jacket of the book reads as follows:

"Using their dominating influence in the world of medical science, drug companies are systematically working to widen the very boundaries that define illness. Old conditions are expanded, new ones created, and the markets for medication grow ever larger. Mild problems are redefined as serious illness and common complaints are labeled as medical conditions requiring drug treatments. Runny noses are now allergic rhinitis, PMS has become a psychiatric disorder, and hyperactive children have ADD. When it comes to conditions like high cholesterol or low bone density, being "at risk" is sold as a disease in its own right..."

"The marketing strategies of the world's biggest drug companies now aggressively target the healthy and the well. The ups and downs of daily life have become mental disorders, common complaints are transformed into frightening conditions, and more and more ordinary people are turned into patients. With promotional campaigns that exploit our deepest fears of death, decay and disease, the $500 billion pharmaceutical industry is literally changing what it means to be human. Rightly rewarded for saving life and reducing suffering, the global drug giants are no longer content selling medicines only to the ill. Because as Wall Street knows well, there's a lot of money to be made telling healthy people they're sick."

Jimmy, I got my copy of Selling Sickness from my public library. I would highly recommend that you read it (it's a quick read) and the chapters cover, in part, high cholesterol, depression, menopause, attention deficit disorder, high blood pressure, osteoporosis, irritable bowel syndrome, etc.

I've heard of this book before and have been trying to get my hands on it. When I do, you can bet I'll write a review here at my blog. THANKS for sharing this with us.