Day 16- Cholesterol, Just a little misunderstood

Let me just start by saying this: low cholesterol scares me more than high cholesterol does (in most cases). My purpose in this blog is to try to clear up some of the confusion on cholesterol.

First let's take a look at the role of cholesterol and why we need it in our body.

• Cholesterol is a precursor for many hormones including hormones that help us manage stress and protect the body against heart disease and cancer, as well as our sex hormones, androgen, testosterone, estrogen, and progesterone.
• Cholesterol is a precursor for Vitamin D
• Cholesterol helps to make bile salts, which are important in the break down of dietary fats
• Cholesterol helps to maintain the proper function of serotonin receptors in the brain
• Babies and children need cholesterol during growth for proper development of the brain and nervous system
• Cholesterol helps to maintain the health of the intestinal wall
• Cholesterol is found in almost every cell of your body - keeping cells firm

Cholesterol has received such a bad rap over the last 20 years; blaming foods such as, eggs and saturated fats for the rise in Cardiac health issues. In turn people have turned to low fat or vegetarian diets and cholesterol lowering medications. If you were to look into the science behind what these lifestyle choices can do to your health you might be saying the same thing that I said in the beginning.

Look at the the physiology behind how the body works and uses cholesterol. The liver is responsible for producing about 75% of the cholesterol in our body; the rest coming from our diets. Scientific studies have demonstrated that cholesterol from food has no effect on the level of our blood cholesterol, since the body produces cholesterol as needed. The more cholesterol that we consume in our diets the less the body will make. So why do some people have high cholesterol? This may be due to things such as, genetics, blood sugar dysregulation, thyroid dysfunction, or GI dysfunction.

Cholesterol can be broken down into several types:

• LDL- Low Density Lipoprotein
• HDL- High Density Lipoprotein
• VLDL-Very Low Density Lipoprotein
  
• Triglycerides- levels are seen to rise from eating too many grains and sugar, being physically inactive, smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol excessively and being overweight.
  

Looking solely on these numbers actually might not tell you much regarding your risk of cardiac disease. Other factors that should be considered are: C- reactive protein (CRP), Homocysteine, and Fibrinogen. Homocysteine- is a top marker for looking at cardiac risk since it has been shown to be correlated with buildup of plaque and the tendency to form clots.

Since cholesterol is a fat, it doesn't mix with the blood very well, so it requires a protein to shuttle it to where it needs to go in the body, this is where they get their name Lipoprotein. It's very common to hear LDL called "bad cholesterol" and HDL called "good cholesterol," but Ron Rosedale, MD explains this concept differently: "LDL and HDL are lipoproteins - fats combined with proteins. There is only one cholesterol. There is no such thing as "good" or "bad" cholesterol. "

So why has Cholesterol received such a bad name? The buzzword is "Inflammation." Inflammation causes thickening of the blood and constricting of the blood vessels, so this combined with the plaque that builds up in damaged arteries can lead to cardiac issues. Cholesterol is needed in the body to repair damaged cells, so when damage occurs the liver is triggered to create more cholesterol which is released and shuttled as the LDL-cholesterol into the blood stream to go fix the damage. Once the damage has been repaired cholesterol is brought back to the liver as HDL- cholesterol. What conventional medicine sees is that there is cholesterol in the bloodstream, but they don't stop to understand the underlying causes on why cholesterol is in the bloodstream, which can be due to the inflammation. The cholesterol is there to do a job; help your body to heal and repair.

Another role of cholesterol is that it acts as an antioxidant in the body to deal with free radical damage. Any wound in the body contains plenty of free radicals because the immune cells use these highly reactive molecules for destroying microbes and toxins. Excess free radicals have to be neutralized, and cholesterol is one of the natural substances that can accomplish this function.

When cholesterol does become a problem in the body, is when it has become oxidized or damaged; this can be seen to cause injury to the arterial walls and further buildup of plaque in the arteries. Cholesterol becomes oxidized when it is exposed to heat; so oils that have been refined or hydrogenated contain oxidized cholesterol. A study at Albany Medical College showed that, "pure unadulterated cholesterol is not harmful to the arteries and cannot initiate or promote heart disease."

Why does low cholesterol scare me?
First of all if the body is releasing more cholesterol, to me it doesn't seem wise to reduce the cholesterol, but instead to reduce the reason that cholesterol is needed. Get to the root of the problem, such as what is causing excess inflammation in the body?

Symptoms related to low cholesterol:

• Higher risk of having depression
• More likely to display violent behavior
• Infertility
• Vitamin D deficiency
• Fat soluble vitamins deficiencies
• More prone to infections

In an article written by Dr. Mercola, he makes a statement about where the baseline for healthy levels of cholesterol come from. Apparently eight of the nine doctors on the panel that developed the new cholesterol guidelines had been making money from the drug companies that manufacture statin cholesterol-lowering drugs.

Currently, the recommend cholesterol is below 200, but will soon be lowered down to 150. If you were to look at the top selling prescription drugs in the US, you will see Lipitor and Zocor as the number 1 and number 2 selling drugs; both cholesterol-lowering medications.

What are the dangers of cholesterol-lowering medications?
Cholesterol-lowering medications work by inhibiting an enzyme in the liver that is needed to make cholesterol. In doing so they can cause:

• Depletion of the enzyme CoQ10- which can lead to fatigue, muscle weakness, or soreness
• Muscle pain and weakness
• Memory loss
• Depression
• Liver Issues
• Tissue breakdown

Let me clarify something here; statin drugs can be beneficial for people with genetically high cholesterol. This condition is called Hyperlipoproteinemia, and there are several forms, which can be determined by a simple lipid electrophoresis blood panel. The scary thing about these conditions is that with one of them, Type IV, it is not advised to use statin drugs because the benefits do not justify the overall risk, but these tests are hardly ever checked. Instead everyone with high cholesterol is automatically placed on a statin drug.

The important take home note here is that eating fats and cholesterol is not going to lead us straight to cardiac issues; it is the types of fats that we are consuming and the lifestyle that we choose to live. It's discouraging to me that cholesterol has taken the blame for these issues and that people are not taking the time to research the validity behind these claims before they agree to be put on statin drugs. If you are someone that is on statin drugs and choose to remain on them, then at least make sure that you are supplementing with CoQ10 and antioxidants to help reduce the effects on the body.


Pura Vida!
Alica Ryan, NTP