Natural Cures for Clinton's Maladies

Now that we have been bombarded with Bill Clinton's health status for the last two days, I wonder just how many people won't get the kind of health care he has had during this time. It is something to think about as AP's Marilynn Marchione, AP Medical Writer, writes that he "...has a new lease on life, but there's no cure for the heart disease that has twice forced the former president to get blocked arteries fixed."

Clinton's taking anti-clotting medication which has long term problems of its own and he was admonished for stopping cholesterol medication. Of course it wasn't considered that cholesterol medication doesn't do too much for atherosclerosis, and nutritional depletion from the drugs was not even mentioned.

There may be no medical cure, but certainly we know that nature cures.

In case Bill reads this while he's recovering in Chappaqua, he'd do well to research the benefits of garlic, cayenne, vitamins B-C-E, and lecithin and how these natural supplements would actually lead to better prevention and cure.

We'd like his doctors to do the same.

FMI:Low micronutrient intake may accelerate the degenerative diseases of aging through allocation of scarce micronutrients by triage.

Lecithin from HEALTH MATTERS

Bruce Ames

Eggs Now an Approved Food

UPDATE: 17 August, 2010 - How Hens are Confined

Eggs have always been a health promoting food, except that somewhere along the line some diet dictocrat decided they were not heart health because they contained cholesterol.

This false notion led to those egg white products loaded with food processing chemicals to enhance shelf live and preserve the products in fluoride containing polyfilm lined paper boxes.

Its a wonder all this took so long to get out in the news. Here is an earlier story from 2001 supporting eggs for health.

And another piece on the health promoting lecithin in egg yolk. Lecithin helps keep your arteries free of plaque and in good shape.

My preference is for organic, free-range brown eggs. Brown eggs have higher sulfur content and that's another health plus.

Regular eggs 'no harm to health'
Limiting egg consumption has little effect on cholesterol levels, research has confirmed.

A University of Surrey team said their work suggested most people could eat as many eggs as they wanted without damaging their health.

The researchers, who analysed several studies of egg nutrition, said the idea that eating more than three eggs a week was bad for you was still widespread.

But they said that was a misconception based on out-of-date evidence.

Writing in the British Nutrition Foundation's Nutrition Bulletin, they said eating saturated fats was far more likely to cause health problems.
Researcher Professor Bruce Griffin said eggs were actually a key part of a healthy diet, as they were particularly packed full of nutrients.

Ingrained misconception

He said: "The ingrained misconception linking egg consumption to high blood cholesterol and heart disease must be corrected.

"The amount of saturated fat in our diet exerts an effect on blood cholesterol that is several times greater than the relatively small amounts of dietary cholesterol.

"The UK public do not need to be limiting the number of eggs they eat - indeed they can be encouraged to include them in a healthy diet as they are one of nature's most nutritionally dense foods."

While elevated blood cholesterol levels increase the risk of heart disease, only around a third of the cholesterol in the body comes from the diet.

Other factors such as smoking, being overweight and physical activity can influence blood fat and cholesterol levels and heart disease risk.

The British Heart Foundation (BHF) dropped its advice to limit egg consumption to three a week in 2007 in light of new evidence.

However, research by the British Egg Information Service suggests 45% of consumers still believe it was sensible to limit consumption.

Victoria Taylor, a senior BHF dietician, said: "We recommend that eggs can be eaten as part of a balanced diet.

"There is cholesterol present in eggs but this does not usually make a great contribution to your level of blood cholesterol.

"If you need to reduce your cholesterol level it is more important that you cut down on the amount of saturated fat in your diet from foods like fatty meat, full fat dairy products and cakes, biscuits and pastries."

In 2007 the Egg Information Service was banned from re-running a television commercial from the 1950s which urged viewers to "go to work on an egg" to celebrate its 50th anniversary.

The Broadcast Advertising Clearance Centre said the slogan went against the principle of eating a varied diet.

Story from BBC NEWS:http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/health/7882850.stm
Published: 2009/02/11 © BBC MMIX

Correcting One of Those Cholesterol Myths

I notice from time to time that people are searching for information about keeping arteries clean and healthy. This may be associated with the rash of anti-cholesterol drug-dosing-on-a-rampage panic, or earnest queries.

Order lecithin granules through simply4health.org to help us continue this work.

I am not a fan of soy. It might be said that if I suggest a soy based supplement that I am ignoring my own best advice. My greatest concern about soy today are the facts that it is generally a GMO crop and it does have many negative health effects.

On the up side, a long used supplement, especially for those who have been convinced that eggs are evil, you might find some salvation in lecithin.

Lecithin is good for you in that it contains phosphatidyl choline, phosphatidyl inositol and essential fatty acids as linoleic acid in a tablespoon of granules. It also contains fish-oil-like, omega-3 linolenic acid. Any one of these substances is not found in a standard daily diet.

Choline & Inositol are essential for the breakdown of fats and cholesterol. And lecithin helps prevent arterial congestion, helps distribute body weight, increases immunity to viral infections, cleans the liver and purifies the kidneys.

Dr. Michael Sharon suggests that it "improves the condition of patients with neurological disorders such as tardive dyskinesia (a side effect of anti-psychotic drugs), Parkinson's disease and Alzheimer's disease or pre-senile dementia."

It may help with improving attention span which would certainly benefit ADD/ADHD issues.

Lecithin helps in maintaining the surface tension of cell wall membranes. Without enough lecithin, the cell wall hardens. This condition contributes to premature aging of the cells. The surface tension of the cell, maintained by lecithin is also responsible for transmitting nerve impulses and messages through or from the cell.

Udo Erasmus, PhD shares some lecithin function facts -

"Lecithin helps keep cholesterol soluble. In a food like eggs, which contain a large amount of cholesterol, it is especially important that lecithin be of high quality.

"Lecithin keeps cholesterol isolated from arterial linings, protects it from oxidation, and helps prevent and dissolve gall and kidney stones by its emulsifying action on fatty substances.

"Lecithin is necessary in our liver's detoxification functions, which keep us from slowly being poisoned by breakdown products of metabolic processes that take place in our body. Poor liver function is a common forerunner of cancer. According to some healers, cancer always involves the liver. Deficiency of either Choline or EFAs can induce cancer in experimental animals, and is likely involved in causing some human cancers.

"Lecithin increases resistance to disease by its role in our thymus gland. Here, EFAs are precursors of several prostaglandins, as well as being vital as part of the ammunition made by our immune cells to kill bacteria (fatty acid peroxides are used to produce bacteriocidal hydrogen peroxide).

"Lecithin is a phospholipid that makes up 22% of both the high density (HDL) and low density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol-carrying vehicles in our blood. These vehicles keep cholesterol and triglyceride fats in solution in our bloodstream and carry them to and from all parts of our body.

"Lecithin is an important part of membrane phospholipids that are involved in electric phenomena, membrane fluidity, and other functions for which EFAs are responsible.

"Finally, lecithin is an important component of bile. Its function in digestion is to break food fats into small droplets (emulsify them), to increase their surface area, speeding up the digestion of fats by enzymes."

Other helpful information about lecithin is that each serving (1 tbsp.) contains:
Choline 275 mg, Inositol 168 mg, Potassium 108 mg, Linoleic Acid (omega 6 EFA) 2,025 mg, Phosphatidylcholine 1,760 mg, Phosphatidylethanolamine 1,530 mg, Phosphatidylinositol 1,070 mg, Linolenic Acid (omega 3 EFA) 260 mg.

and Lecithin

Breaks up fats and cholesterol, Excellent for a healthy heart
Contains the Highest Phosphatide concentration available (98% or more!)
Is a Rich source of GLA (Gamma Linoleic Acid)
Helps the body utilize Vitamins A,D,E and K
Is Excellent for memory, concentration and recall
Cleanses liver and kidneys
Helps the body absorb nutrients

Lessen Chronic Inflammation
People whose diets supplied the highest average intake of choline (found in egg yolk and soybeans), and its metabolite betaine (found naturally in vegetables such as beets and spinach), have levels of inflammatory markers at least 20% lower than subjects with the lowest average intakes, report Greek researchers in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (Detopoulou P, Panagiotakos DB, et al.)

Compared to those whose diets contained <250 mg/day of choline, subjects whose diets supplied >310 mg of choline daily had, on average:

* 22% lower concentrations of C-reactive protein
* 26% lower concentrations of interleukin-6
* 6% lower concentrations of tumor necrosis factor alpha

Compared to those consuming <260 mg/day of betaine, subjects whose diets provided >360 mg per day of betaine had, on average:

* 10% lower concentrations of homocysteine
* 19% lower concentrations of C-reactive protein
* 12% lower concentrations of tumor necrosis factor alpha

Each of these markers of chronic inflammation has been linked to a wide range of conditions including heart disease, osteoporosis, cognitive decline and Alzheimer's, and type-2 diabetes.

In an accompanying editorial in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition entitled, "Is there a new component of the Mediterranean diet that reduces inflammation?," Steven Zeisel from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill noted that choline and betaine work together in the cellular process of methylation, which is not only responsible for the removal of homocysteine, but is involved in turning off the promoter regions of genes involved in inflammation.

"Exposure to oxidative stress is a potent trigger for inflammation. Betaine is formed from choline within the mitochondria , and this oxidation contributes to mitochondrial redox status ," Zeisel continued.

"If the association between choline and betaine and inflammation can be confirmed in studies of other populations, an interesting new dietary approach may be available for reducing chronic diseases associated with inflammation," he concluded.

Recommended daily intakes of choline were set in 1998 at 550 milligrams per day for men and 425 milligrams a day for women. No RDI has been set for betaine, which, since it is a metabolite of choline, is not considered an essential nutrient.

Practical Tip: Egg yolks are the richest source of choline, followed by soybeans. Spinach, beets and whole wheat products are primary sources of betaine. (Olthof MR, van Vliet T, et al. J Nutr)

Boosting Drug Sales with Studies

For quite a number of years many health professionals have been speaking out against the statin class of drugs.

Much of the concern is associated kidney failure secondary to muscle wasting. Other serious effects have been noted, yet the drug giants keep coming up with ways to try to convince absolutely everyone they need to be taking these drugs.

Now even the "healthy".

One of the key investigators busting this myth has been Uffe Ravnskov, MD

And what ever happened to improving health with foods and supplements to reduce or eliminate this problem.

Recall that the homogenization of milk (and lack of access to raw milk) really kicked off the march to atherosclerosis back in the 1950s.

And remember that lecithin or eating plain applesauce mixed in plain yoghurt aids healthy, clean and flexible arteries. And with major cost savings over these drugs.

Other issues are the fact that many of the statin drugs are fluoride based, such as Baychol - now off the market.

Even Red Rice Yeast can have the same side effects of the drugs.

Statins and the problems associated with their use is the result of marketing a class of drugs before it was fully investigated.

The imprecise use of statin medications is one big reason why side effects occur in more than 40 percent of patients and why 60-75 percent of statin users discontinue treatment.

Crestor averages about $2 a pill, with a range from $1.41 to $3.41 at a variety of pharmacies. The drug company profit for these drugs is in the 4000 percent range. If you get 10 mg of Crestor when you only need 1 mg, risks increase drastically. With each doubling of a statin dosage, the risk of liver injury also doubles.

Concerned about the renal effects of Crestor, some people have been openly weighing the options between taking a statin or accepting a higher cholesterol number. (For instance, is high cholesterol "normal"? Have we fallen victim to high-end marketing tactics?)

All the statin drugs can cause rhabdomyolysis and kidney failure. In most cases the kidney failure is secondary to blocking of the tiny kidney tubules by the breakdown fragments of muscle cells. The mechanism of action here is loss of cell wall integrity of the muscle cells due to interference of the statin drugs with the vital role of ubiquinone in our bodies.

Ubiquinone, known also as Co-enzyme Q10, is collaterally damaged during the statin drug effect on the so- called mevalonate pathway of cholesterol biosynthesis. Ubiquinone metabolism is a branch on the mevalonate "tree" inevitably damaged by these statin drug "reductase inhibitor" action and the stronger the statin, the more severe this effect.

Public Citizen filed a Citizen's Petition with the FDA suggesting that Crestor be removed from the market. Though the courts did not pass a judgement in favor of Public Citizen (thus allowing Crestor to remain a legally prescribed medication), the case brought to light the fact that statins like Crestor can and do cause serious problems in many patients who take them.

In May of 2005, a study published in the American Heart Association's journal, Circulation, revealed that kidney problems and muscle weakness were two to eight times more frequent among Crestor users than those taking other cholesterol-lowering drugs.

Read more

more

and more

Study: Wider cholesterol drug use may save lives
By MARILYNN MARCHIONE, AP Medical Writer Marilynn Marchione, Ap Medical Writer
Sun Nov 9, 9:44 am ET

NEW ORLEANS – People with low cholesterol and no big risk for heart disease dramatically lowered their chances of dying or having a heart attack if they took the cholesterol pill Crestor, a large study found.

The results, reported Sunday at an American Heart Association conference, were hailed as a watershed event in heart disease prevention. Doctors said the study might lead as many as 7 million more Americans to consider taking cholesterol-lowering statin drugs, sold as Crestor, Lipitor, Zocor or in generic form.

"This takes prevention to a whole new level, because it applies to patients who we now wouldn't have any evidence to treat," said Dr. W. Douglas Weaver, a Detroit cardiologist and president of the American College of Cardiology.

The study also gives the best evidence yet for using a new test to identify people who may need treatment, according to a statement from Dr. Elizabeth Nabel, director of the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute. The new research will be considered by experts reviewing current guidelines.

However, some doctors urged caution. Crestor gave clear benefit in the study, but so few heart attacks and deaths occurred among these low-risk people that treating everyone like them in the United States could cost up to $9 billion a year — "a difficult sell," one expert said.

About 120 people would have to take Crestor for two years to prevent a single heart attack, stroke or death, said Stanford University cardiologist Dr. Mark Hlatky. He wrote an editorial accompanying the study published online by the New England Journal of Medicine.

"Everybody likes the idea of prevention. We need to slow down and ask how many people are we going to be treating with drugs for the rest of their lives to prevent heart disease, versus a lot of other things we're not doing" to improve health, Hlatky said.

Statins are the world's top-selling drugs. Until this study, all but Crestor have already been shown to cut the risk of heart attacks and death in people with high LDL, or bad cholesterol.

But half of all heart attacks occur in people with normal or low cholesterol, so doctors have been testing other ways to predict who is at risk.

One is high-sensitivity C-reactive protein, or CRP for short. It is a measure of inflammation, which can mean clogged arteries as well as less serious problems, such as an infection or injury. Doctors check CRP with a blood test that costs about $80 to have done.

A co-inventor on a patent of the test, Dr. Paul Ridker of Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, led the new study. It involved 17,802 people with high CRP and low LDL cholesterol (below 130) in the U.S. and 25 other countries.

One-fourth were black or Hispanic, and 40 percent were women — important because previous statin studies have included few women. Men had to be 50 or older; women, 60 or older. None had a history of heart problems or diabetes.

They were randomly assigned to take dummy pills or Crestor, the strongest statin on the market, made by British-based AstraZeneca PLC. Neither participants nor their doctors knew who was taking what.

The study was supposed to last five years but was stopped in March, after about two years, when independent monitors saw that those taking Crestor were faring better than the others.

Full results were announced Sunday. Crestor reduced a combined measure — heart attacks, strokes, heart-related deaths or hospitalizations, or the need for an artery-opening procedure — by 44 percent.

"We reduced the risk of a heart attack by 54 percent, the risk of a stroke by 48 percent and the chance of needing bypass surgery or angioplasty by 46 percent," Ridker said.

Looked at another way, there were 136 heart-related problems per year for every 10,000 people taking dummy pills versus 77 for those on Crestor.

Remarkably, every single subgroup benefited from the drug.

"If you're skinny it worked, if you're heavy it worked. If you lived here or there, if you smoked, it worked," Ridker said.

AstraZeneca paid for the study, and Ridker and other authors have consulted for the company and other statin makers.

One concern: More people in the Crestor group saw blood-sugar levels rise or were newly diagnosed with diabetes.

Crestor also has the highest rate among statins of a rare but serious muscle problem, so there are probably safer and cheaper ways to get the same benefits, said Dr. Sidney Wolfe of the consumer group Public Citizen.

"It is highly unlikely that (the benefits are) specific to Crestor," said Wolfe, who has campaigned against the drug in the past.

Crestor costs $3.45 a day versus less than a dollar for generic drugs.

Drs. James Stein and Jon Keevil of the University of Wisconsin-Madison used federal health statistics to project that 7.4 million Americans, or more than 4 percent of the adult population, are like the people in this study.

Treating them all with Crestor would cost $9 billion a year and prevent about 30,000 heart attacks, strokes or deaths, they calculate.

"That's pretty costly. This would be a very difficult sell" unless a person also had family history or other heart disease risk factors, said Dr. Thomas Pearson of the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry.

Pearson was co-chairman of a joint government-heart association panel that wrote current guidelines for using CRP tests to guide treatment.

Researchers do not know whether the benefits seen in the study were due to reducing CRP or cholesterol, since Crestor did both.

This study and two other government-sponsored ones reported on Sunday "provide the strongest evidence to date" for testing C-reactive protein, and adding it to traditional risk measures could identify millions more people who would benefit from treatment, Nabel's statement says.

U.S. Crestor prescriptions totaled $420 million in the third quarter of this year, up 23 percent from a year earlier. In the rest of the world, third quarter sales were $520 million, up 33 percent.

Sales have been rising even though two statins — Zocor and Pravachol — are now available in generic form.

On the Net:
New England Journal: http://www.nejm.org
Heart conference: http://www.americanheart.org
Government: http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/dci/Diseases/Cad/CAD_WhatIs.html