Going to see the Cardiologist next month and.........

[89826]

Pamojja, I have a slightly different view. All animal foods and fish, including shell fish, damage the endothelium in all humans. That is well established because it is very easy to test very quickly, using something called the brachial artery tourniquet test. That test measures the production of nitric oxide, which is a vasodilator. It is the endothelial cells which produce nitric oxide.

It is well established that a damaged endothelium is the first step in a cascade of events leading to plaque rupture and thrombosis. In my view, the emphasis on genes saving people is vastly overstated.

[89826]

Complex carbohydrates, i.e. starches, on the other hand are ideal food and fuel.

To me they shoot blood glucose through the roof. You just cannot generalize dietary recommendations without taking bio-individuallity into account.

Pam, I am highly skeptical of that statement. You would be unique, as far as I am aware, if that were the case.

[pamojja]

Pamojja, I have a slightly different view. All animal foods and fish, including shell fish, damage the endothelium in all humans. That is well established because it is very easy to test very quickly, using something called the brachial artery tourniquet test. That test measures the production of nitric oxide, which is a vasodilator. It is the endothelial cells which produce nitric oxide.

It is well established that a damaged endothelium is the first step in a cascade of events leading to plaque rupture and thrombosis. In my view, the emphasis on genes saving people is vastly overstated.

There aren't any endpoints, like CVD events or mortality in relation to the brachial artery tourniquet test, where the arteries are unnaturally constricted for 5 minutes after a meal before measuring! (A variable that just hasn't occurred even once in my whole life!) - And as there are in the study just posted comparing the intervention with low fat/cholesterol versus high fat/cholesterol with 30% versus 1,6% endpoint events.

Without such already established endpoints in long therm studies the brachial artery tourniquet test remains experimental at best, and doesn't establish at all that in that particular way damaged endothelium (by a otherwise almost never occurring constriction of the arteries for 5 minutes) along with different fat intake would leads to serious endpoints, like plaque rupture and thrombosis. - And which to the opposite was established in the study just posted with almost 1000 patients with serious CVD.

[pamojja]

Pam, I am highly skeptical of that statement. You would be unique, as far as I am aware, if that were the case.

Before posting again, please listen this video of a pathologist asking 'Does LCHF Improve Your Blood Tests?'

In my case changing to a high fat/moderate low carb prevented me going from prediabetic to full blown - HDL, Trigs and LDL have improved in average by 41% during the last 6 years.

In which way have your blood indicators changed since you changed to low fat?

[Montmorency]

Complex carbohydrates, i.e. starches, on the other hand are ideal food and fuel.

To me they shoot blood glucose through the roof. You just cannot generalize dietary recommendations without taking bio-individuallity into account.

Pam, I am highly skeptical of that statement. You would be unique, as far as I am aware, if that were the case.

And I am highly skeptical of the statement that all animal and fish proteins and oils cause endothelial damage.
How would you explain the Inuit when they lived traditional lifestyles, who ate very little other than meat and fish?
If this had been so unhealthy, they would have died out.

And while no one knows really what our paleolithic ancestors ate, it almost certainly contained some meat, and the fatty parts of the meat have always been prized in traditional societies. The concept of "the fat of the land", didn't come from nowhere.

I've listened to McDougall lecturing, and wasn't convinced. However, I'm prepared to believe than an all-starch diet works for some people, but it would drive me crazy. My mother is 92, has no known heart disease, still has her marbles, lives an independent life, and eats meat - perhaps not a ton of meat, but she eats it regularly (my Dad was a butcher, and she worked alongside him for many years. There was never a shortage of meat at home. My Dad lived to 85 and was never ill until the end).

Dr Richard David Feinman (a professor of biochemistry), in his book "The World Turned Upside Down", says that no trial has proved that low fat diets are beneficial for heart health.

As far as "oils" are concerned, the only one I will use is virgin coconut oil, which is highly saturated and solid at room temperature in temperate climates. Olive oil is mostly MUFA, which is ok, but has sufficient PUFA that I wouldn't want to consume it on a regular basis (plus there are doubts about the integrity of many sources of supply of this stuff). However, I'm happy to eat raw grass-fed butter, and the fats of lamb and beef (ruminants), which are a mixture of SFA and MUFA, and only a tiny amount of PUFA.
(I personally don't trust modern pork fat, and don't really care for pork).

I won't touch pure PUFA "vegetable" oils, not really because of heart health concerns, but other concerns.

[89826]

Pam, apologies but I don't follow your post. The Bart test is a way to measure the health of the endothelium by seeing how quickly arteries dilate after being constricted. That's the primary role of nitric oxide in the body-- it is a vasodilator. Again, endothelial cells release nitric oxide.

Of course people don't routinely constrict their arteries. It is only a test, a means to evaluate the health of the endothelium. As I said before, the mechanisms for heart attacks (there are two distinct ones) are now well understood. (Their causes less so. That's were Pauling's ideas come into play.) Endothelial failure leaves the soft plaques exposed to the rushing blood stream, which leads to rupture and thrombosis. Again, that is well understood now.

All oils and animal protein destroy the endothelium. No uncertainty in that statement. Google away.

The lifespan of the Inuit people isn't very appealing.

I encourage you to listen to some lectures on you tube given by Caldwell Esselstyn, a physician at the Cleveland Clinic. They are very interesting, learned, and detailed, discussing mechanisms and showing proof of plaque reversal.

I would love to see comparable proof of plaque reversal using Pauling's protocol. I don't think it exists, sorry to say. But his ideas have immense logic and appeal, so I am playing both instruments. Why not? They don't conflict at all.

[89826]

I agree that humans evolved eating some animal protein, but not very much at all. How can you know? Several ways: we need B12, which comes from animal protein, but we store it very effectively-- we don't need to consume foods with it very often to maintain an adequate supply. We have a reserve good for something like 2 to 4 years. (That's of course very different for vitamin C.) Second, eating animal protein destroys the endothelium, but it regrows in about three weeks, when the insults stop. So if we consume animal protein (there weren't any free oils in early man's environment) more frequently than that, it is always compromised, so why have it all then? Third, our physiology is not that of carnivores or omnivores, but rather herbivores. There are over a dozen physiological traits showing that.

Low-fat diets can be very unhealthy. I am talking about plant-based nutrition.

I am going to sign off with this now. You can lead a horse to water ...

Good luck.

[pamojja]

I am going to sign off with this now. You can lead a horse to water ...

If you don't follow up your own most basic biomarkers which have been associated with CVD events or mortality (and debilitating symptoms of claudatio intermittens, as in my case), but only one experimental test, conflicting with the hard endpoints already studied with high fat diets - not even tested in yourself - while adhering to a diet that has shown again and again a 30% rate of 5-year CVD events - I have to assume one really can't lead a horse blinded by ideology to water.

Pam, apologies but I don't follow your post.

You didn't follow up on your mistaken assessment, that low carb/high fat couldn't improve blood glucose and other more important lipids fractions. Or answered how your generally propagated low fat diet (without considering bio-individuallity) has improved your own CVD risk markers. Since it seems difficult for you to answer straight questions and follow a conversation apology accepted.

Good luck to you too.

I encourage you to listen to some lectures on you tube given by Caldwell Esselstyn, a physician at the Cleveland Clinic. They are very interesting, learned, and detailed, discussing mechanisms and showing proof of plaque reversal.

Linus Pauling has devoted a whole chapter to Biochemical Individuality in HTLLAFB many decades ago. Now his assessment has been confirmed by the different response to diets in different ApoE genotypes. I don't understand how anyone could still ignore that data in year 2015.

The only way to know which diet is good for you remains repeated testing one's own risk markers. And than adjust one's diet accordingly.

I would love to see comparable proof of plaque reversal using Pauling's protocol.

???

I test an approach (supplemental, dietary or lifestyle), if it works for me I keep it. Otherwise I adjust and test again. When it works for me, why would I need any further proof? It did the job.

One only needs further proof if one turns one's own approach into a religion wrongly thinking it must work for everyone.

[89826]

Fool-nice guy that I am ...

Here's one example of why lipid profiles don't necessarily mean a damn thing. You want healthy arteries, not just good numbers. This also perhaps speaks to your belief that oils can be good for you. There was a study done with African green monkeys: 5 years, two groups, one group given a diet high in saturated fat, the other equal calories in olive oil. All along the way their blood was tested, and the olive-oil eaters showed just what you would have hoped for and even what you might have expected: higher hdl, lower ldl, and lower triglycerides. Nothing but good news. The monkeys were killed and autopsied at the end kf the study. Both groups had the same massive atherosclerosis.

It sounds like you in particular could really benefit from a plant-based diet, given what you said about your intermittent claudication. That will go away.

In Esselstyn's initial study, done with something like 24 cardiac patients, he got the sickest of the sick. They couldn't stand any more stents or bypasses- they basically had been given death sentences. The compliant patients (those who adhered to a plant-based diet) all lived beyond 5 years with 0 further cardiac events. The handful who didn't all died.

Here's an idea. Take one hour out of your life and watch one of his full lectures on you tube. At the end of the hour, if you think it's nonsense, you can come back here and have the satisfaction of telling me that I am ignorant, full of beans, hopeless, and clueless. On the off chance you think what he says has merit, you might have saved your own life. All you risk is one measly hour of your time.

Do you have proof of your plaque reversal? I am very interested to see it, because I want to see confirmation of the worth of Pauling's protocol. Esselstyn does indeed have it and shows cases in some of his lectures.

Again, I myself had a nearly fatal heart attack, so I have skin in this game also. The Pauling protocol doesn't conflict at all with plant-based nutrition. I use both myself.

My father was a chemist himself and knew Linus Pauling. He was nominated for a Nobel Prize but didn't win. He was the first to synthesize the neurotransmitter serotonin, for his doctoral thesis at Harvard.

Sounds like you are wrestling with type 2 diabetes also. Have a look at this: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iosoXlr3ZVI

[pamojja]

Do you have proof of your plaque reversal? I am very interested to see it, because I want to see confirmation of the worth of Pauling's protocol.

...It sounds like you in particular could really benefit from a plant-based diet, given what you said about your intermittent claudication. That will go away.

Want to remember that one of my first reply to you was in this threat:

Eating a plant-based diet helps on both fronts.

I ate a plant-based diet (no eggs, fish or fats) since age 10. By age 42 was diagnosed a PAD due to a 80% stenosis at the abdominal aorta bifurcation with the debilitating symptoms of claudatio intermittens, a pain-free walking distance of only 3-400 meters.

Went up to 70% of my calories from fat and down to 10% in carbs along with Pauling's Therapy. And my walking distance improved greatly since.

Forget to add that the PAD started almost 7 years ago, and since beginning of this year I had no claudatio intermittens pains at all anymore.

Therefore I indeed do have a very consistent proof that Pauling Therapy along with high fat/moderated carb diet worked gradually for me. And I told you already the reason why I don't want to make a religion valid for everyone out of it: Simply because nothing works for everyone, there ore only likelihoods due to differing biochemical-individualities. Only the proof in your personal life that your approach works for you is what counts.

Sounds like you are wrestling with type 2 diabetes also.

Why you are twisting my words? I clearly said that a 'pre-diabetes' reverted to normal on a high fat/moderated carb diet!

There was a study done with African green monkeys: 5 years, two groups, one group given a diet high in saturated fat, the other equal calories in olive oil. All along the way their blood was tested, and the olive-oil eaters showed just what you would have hoped for and even what you might have expected: higher hdl, lower ldl, and lower triglycerides. Nothing but good news. The monkeys were killed and autopsied at the end kf the study. Both groups had the same massive atherosclerosis.

You are aware that monkey usually don't eat much saturated fats or olive oil at all?
For example, there where numerous studies at the end of last century by letting animal inhale tobacco smoke 24/7 to prove that tobacco causes early death. These experiments all backfired badly, because the smoking animals all outlived the non-smoking. Until it was found that after a 10-day 'washout period' the now formerly smoking animals indeed did develop more cancers. That is just one example how intervention in animal can't predict with certainty the outcome when it is applied to humans.

In Esselstyn's initial study, done with something like 24 cardiac patients, he got the sickest of the sick. They couldn't stand any more stents or bypasses- they basically had been given death sentences. The compliant patients (those who adhered to a plant-based diet) all lived beyond 5 years with 0 further cardiac events. The handful who didn't all died.

The study I posted had almost a thousand serious CVD patients followed up for in average 9 years. Why would you consider a study running only for have the time and with 1/40 of patients that much more valid???

You still didn't answered where your condition improved with your approach. You could tell any marker or symptom you consider valid. Instead you deflect again, by baiting me to provide proof for my improvement, and thereby ignore to answer a simple personal question. For which I never would ask for 'proof', since that is impossible over a public forum.

And you still deny without personal experience with a blood glucose meter that a high fat/ moderate carb diet does improve blood glucose levels.

[89826]

Good luck Pam. Only trying to be helpful.

[pamojja]

Only trying to be helpful.

I understand your enthusiasm and appreciate your good intention to be helpful.

But if you don't experiment unbiased, don't reevaluate any symptoms or bio-markers at all, you might not be of any help even to your own health. Faith is needed too, but alone without accumulating personal experiences might lead you ashtray.

[89826]

Pam, I am going to be charitable here and call you only confused and misguided. In 2009 you wrote:

Have to add, I've been vegetarian for most of my life and my main source of protein consists of lentils and milk products.

Just above here in this thread, you quote yourself as eating a plant-based diet since the age of 10.

Those two diets are not nearly the same. Milk products are not plant foods. They are high in animal protein, cholesterol, and saturated fat.

The reason I spent a few minutes to investigate your posts is you have reported circulatory problems. That would be very surprising-- shocking actually -- if you truly had eaten a plant-based diet. But you haven't. You have spent a lifetime eating foods, probably more than most, which damage your arteries. That also explains your diabetes or near-diabetes, whatever you want to call it. My puzzlement has turned into further supporting evidence.

Good luck; I am afraid you're going to need it.

[pamojja]

Ahh, very good you're starting to investigate..

That also explains your diabetes or near-diabetes, whatever you want to call it. My puzzlement has turned into further supporting evidence.

Just to clarify again, when I started my path to health and measuring blood markers, to my surprise my average (measured for a whole month) fasting blood glucose came back at 124 mg/dl (100-125 is considered pre-diabetic). However, beside some very high spikes (for example after meals with grains), postprandial blood glucose spikes (measured 1 hour after the meal) never averaged higher than 147 mg/dl. Which quickly improved by becoming more strict with grain avoidance. For the last 3 years it now has been 93 for fasting and 123 mg/dl postprandial, therefore no more prediabetic at all.

Just above here in this thread, you quote yourself as eating a plant-based diet since the age of 10.

Those two diets are not nearly the same. Milk products are not plant foods.

Good point. Though I shunned everything fatty like cream, butter or oils, but did have long times with cheeses and milk. Therefore, you're right that my experience does more speak about how being lacto-vegetarian was one of many factors leading to PAD. And not about the vegan lifestyle.

But how by adding fatty butter, eggs, healthy oils and fatty fish back in my diet (up to 70% of calories from fats), along with comprehensive supplementation, did not prevent from recovering from my most debilitating claudatio intermittent pains at all. Only to the contrary

Something all my cardiologist thought impossible, unless I would surgically replace my whole Y-shaped abdominal aorta with a goretex kind of tube.

That's what's good enough for me. Having experimentally experienced the benefit of a particular life-style intervention (ie. eating according to postprandial blood glucose readings) of no more debilitating pains and being able to really walk in nature again (my passion before all this started).

I never said you're wrong in placing your faith in a particular life-style intervention. But after some time, if you don't experience any tangible benefits from it, you're really cheating yourself.

Therefore, keep experimenting and learning along the way. However, whenever you generally recommend low-fat without any personal experience - and since you're not unterstanding real science about hard endpoints such as increased mortality on low-fat diets - I will continue to relate my existing experience to give a different valid perspective. So that newbies don't get lost in ideology, but instead start to measure their particular approach and benefits too.

Pam, I am going to be charitable here and call you only confused and misguided.

You will have to let each reader decide for them self - how your categorical refusal to accept highly powered science, moreover to mention any improvement in your own life on your recommended protocol, along with derogatory remarks - might come across.

For my part we are not meeting here to beat each other up because of different faiths, but to learn from another for better health and happiness for each of us, no matter how different we consider us to be.

Your refusal to share your personal experience of improval makes it difficult to learn from you, other than giving the impression of you being too defensive and not open to sharing with others.

[89826]

Very smooth; you made me a little sheepish for responding in kind.

I have posted a couple of links here which can save your life. From what you describe, you are in a pickle. They will only take a very short time to look at. I understand that to a lay person almost all studies and theories can sound equally convincing. Of course they are not all equally good. How do you distinguish? That's the million dollar question.

Fix the fuel. That is not a low-carbohydrate high-fat diet.