Archive for the ‘cardiovascular disease’ Category

Do Statins Lower Cholesterol Too Much? Memory Loss, Hormone Decline and Diabetes Can Follow

Thursday, March 22nd, 2012

Statins

Statins

You need it to make every cell in your body, hormones such as estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, cortisol and DHEA , as well as, Vitamin D and bile acids. Wouldn’t you say that these are essential to life? Not having enough cholesterol to make these essential hormones, bile and vitamins can put you in danger. Many of the diseases that middle-aged persons begin experiencing including depression, abdominal weight gain, prostate, breast and heart disease are directly related to hormone imbalances.

The recommendations have been to keep cholesterol low to protect you from heart disease. It is questionable whether it has had the desired effect on heart disease since that has many factors besides cholesterol as its cause. There are at least 14 independent risk factors that cause arteries to narrow as we age. While high LDL (low-density lipoprotein) and total cholesterol are two of these causes, the other 12 factors also have to be controlled to maintain lifelong healthy blood flow. What the medical community and media are finally recognizing is that levels that are too low can cause harm.

The most popular drug class that is used to lower it, statins, can have some harmful effects. While I don’t recommend stopping your medications completely, I do recommend finding the underlying cause, correcting it and using some lifestyle and natural means to get it to a reasonable level with or without the use of drugs. If you must take a drug, use the lowest dose to achieve the desired result.

Cholesterol can become elevated due to a variety of factors:

  • Genetic
  • Inflammation
  • Oxidation
  • Sedentary Lifestyle
  • Diet
  • Smoking
  • Hormone imbalance

Correcting the underlying factors stated above, may allow you to stop or lower your dose. If you don’t have many risk factors for heart disease, your cholesterol levels may not need to be too low., If you have many risk factors for heart disease keep your LDL level around 100 but not less than 70 and a total cholesterol level between 200 and 180. Consult your doctor for the levels that are right for you.

Cholesterol levels that are too low can increase:

  • Overall increased rate of death or mortality
  • Suicidal behavior
  • Depression
  • Stroke due to bleeding
  • Cancer

Statin drugs

  • Brand names ending in “or” such as:  Crestor, Lipitor, Zocor, etc
  • Generic names ending in “statin” such as:  rosuvastatin, atorvastatin, simvastatin etc.
  • Some not so well known side effects of statin drugs:
    • Memory loss
    • Increased risk of diabetes
    • Depletion of coenzyme Q 10 (otherwise known as ubiquinone, ubiquinol, CoQ10)
    • Fatigue, decreased exercise endurance
    • Muscle pain, muscle breakdown, cramps
    • Liver and kidney toxicity
    • Low thyroid function

Lifestyle, antioxidant and anti-inflammatory food and supplements, low saturated fat diet, increasing Omega 3 fatty acids,exercise and hormone replacement and balance can dramatically lower your cholesterol. It’s more work than just taking a pill, however the benefits are longevity with a quality of life that can keep you slim, sharp, sexy, strong and supercharged. Learn more from my blogs, newsletters, books and programs at www.vibranceforlife.com

Lorraine Maita, MD is an award winning physician, speaker and author of “Vibrance for Life: How to Live Younger and Healthier”. She is an expert in anti aging medicine, bioidentical hormone replacement, weight loss, nutrition, supplements and executive health.  She has a private practice in Anti Aging Medicine www.howtoliveyounger.com in Short Hills, NJ.  You can live younger and healthier; Click Here to Get my Best 7 Tips on How to Live Younger and Healthier!

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Genetics Unlocks Heart Disease Risk and Treatment

Friday, June 18th, 2010

The standard of care for people with risk factors for heart disease and high cholesterol is statin therapy. Since not everyone reacts well to medication or other treatment modalities, by looking at genetic variants we can better determine who is at risk and what the most effective treatment is.
Previous research has shown that a variant of the KIF6 (719arg variant) gene is associated with up to a 55% increased risk of primary and recurrent coronary heart disease events and that this increased risk is virtually eliminated with statin therapy. To date, the benefit of statin therapy for KIF6 carriers has only been studied with atorvastatin and pravastatin.

An overly simplified process of how disease develops is that small, dense particles of cholesterol get oxidized; the oxidized particles stick to artery walls and inflames them. An artery’s response to inflammation is the formation of plaque that narrows the artery. Plaque builds up and clots form on the plaques further narrowing the arteries. These plaques become unstable and rupture, resulting in complete blockage of arteries in your heart causing a myocardial infarction or blocking arteries in your brain causing a stroke. This process can happen anywhere in your body.

Data suggests that a specific variant of the KIF6 gene may play a role in the inflammatory process that can form unstable plaques which may rupture and block arteries. Once the artery is blocked, the lack of blood flow to the tissues causes death of those tissues and the extent of damage is dependent on the size of the area the artery feeds.

Knowing that you are at increased risk can guide therapy, as statins are not uniformly necessary or effective in all people. Inflammation can also be decreased with diet and supplements and other cardiovascular risk factors could be treated more aggressively.

Genetic testing is now simple and affordable. A simple cheek swab can determine if you have the KIF6 variant gene, as well as other genes that predict risk of cardiovascular disease. Knowing you risk can determine if you should do further testing to look at your other risk factors and extent of arterial blockage as well as to target therapy. Talk to your doctor to determine if this test is recommended for you.

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