Posted on 10/02/2006 9:15:49 PM PDT by neverdem
ROME — Every patient in the cardiac care unit at the San Filippo Neri Hospital who survives a heart attack goes home with a prescription for purified fish oil, or omega-3 fatty acids.
“It is clearly recommended in international guidelines,” said Dr. Massimo Santini, the hospital’s chief of cardiology, who added that it would be considered tantamount to malpractice in Italy to omit the drug.
In a large number of studies, prescription fish oil has been shown to improve survival after heart attacks and to reduce fatal heart rhythms. The American College of Cardiology recently strengthened its position on the medical benefit of fish oil, although some critics say that studies have not defined the magnitude of the effect.
But in the United States, heart attack victims are not generally given omega-3 fatty acids, even as they are routinely offered more expensive and invasive treatments, like pills to lower cholesterol or implantable defibrillators. Prescription fish oil, sold under the brand name Omacor, is not even approved by the Food and Drug Administration for use in heart patients.
“Most cardiologists here are not giving omega-3’s even though the data supports it — there’s a real disconnect,” said Dr. Terry Jacobson, a preventive cardiologist at Emory University in Atlanta. “They have been very slow to incorporate the therapy.”
The fact that heart patients receive such different treatments in sophisticated hospitals around the world highlights the central role that drug companies play in disseminating medical information, experts said.
Because prescription fish oil is not licensed to prevent heart disease in the United States, drug companies may not legally promote it for that purpose at conferences, in doctors’ offices, to patients or even on the Internet.
“If people paid more attention to guidelines, more people would be on the drug,” Dr. Jacobson said. “But...”
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
So is there a nonprescription alternative?
Herbalife was promoting this stuff 20 years ago.
In the US, only FDA approved drugs can actually be beneficial to people - Silly.
Follow the money to find each and every nonsensical thing congress pushes down our throats(or not in this case) in these United States.
Sure lots of Omega-3 stuff on the market
The downside of this treatment for the U.S. medical industry would be that fish oil doesn't cost $250 a bottle.
You can get high quality omega 3's at a health food place. Some molecularly distilled, like Jarrows.
Studies in the 60s and 70s also showed the importance of Magnesium. Absolutely essential for something like 300 enzyme processes in the body. Many chronic cases of angina were cured with Magnesium. Just google "magnesium heart"
Also the Budwig diet....a spoon of flax-oil a day mixed with yougart is touted to reduce cholesterol by half in six months.
Why doesn't the NY Times pack up its operations and move to Europe. I'm sure that its management and employees would be much more happy if that were the case. They could call it an extended vacation a la the French.
So, people aren't smart enough to know about EFA and they can't quite find a health food store where they can buy all the Omega 3 EFA capsules they need for next to nothing?
No, they have to be TOLD. Nanny state and all that. Jeez.....
Most health food stores carry Omega-3 products. There are also Omega-6 and Omega-9.
Fish oil is the primary source, but there are some alternate vegetable source products, too.
Shoot, you're right, I should have known that :o)
the fish oil seems to have helped me.
Go to www.lef.org. Order their Mega GLA/DHA (the important Omega-3's) with Sesame Lignans. They are fanatic about the quality of products they sell. They cost a little more than other companies but it's worth it.
It's OTC. Lots of evidence that it prevents heart attacks in the first place and prevents reoccurence.
From what I've read about the whole cholesterol thing, it was bad science that gave it the rep in the first place.
Cholesterol is very important to the body, being the building block of most of the hormones, and used in tissue repair, I think it's involved in collagen synthesis.
When some of the early studies of heart problems were done, the cholesterol found imbedded in the arteries was assumed to be the cause. But it was a symptom of artery inflammation and the effects of oxidative stress. The cholesterol was there because the body was trying to fix the problem.
85% of the cholesterol in your body never passed your lips. It was made in your very own liver.
Clearly, diet is important. But IMHO the "fad" part of medicine has poorly served many. There is now a skyrocketing number of breat cancer cases. But as they've recently discovered, these cases could be significantly reduced by vitamin D. Same deal with colon cancer. Estimates are 50,000 more people a year died from other forms of cancer than might have gotten skin cancer if people got enough vitamin D.
Now they are saying if you don't get enough Omega 3's, your cells will take up the trans-fats into the cell membranes. And they totally mess up the chemistry of the cell.
Fish oil has many benefits. In addition to the ones mentioned, it also helps alleviate dry eye, especially in post-menopausal women. The only thing bad about fish oil is it gives you oily hair and skin when taken in large quantities. The lower quality forms can also go rancid and taste fishy, so it pays to use the purified product.
E-mail me and I will tell where to get it!
Heart Health™ Essential Omega III Essential Omega III helps maintain healthy triglyceride and cholesterol levels by providing omega-3 fatty acids and beneficial fish oils, which have been clinically demonstrated to provide a host of benefits that successfully promote cardiovascular health.
Yes, there are alternatives. My wife is a pharmaceutical sales rep and yes, doctors go almost entirely on what the drug company reps tell them.
Docosahexanoic Acid, or DHA (the truly active part of Omega 3 fatty acids), has been shown over and over to have a very strong affect on:
inflammation
healthy HDL/LDL levels
cardiovascular protection (prevents hardening caused by atherosclerosis)
neuronal cell development; neurotransmitters and their receptors, such as the 5HTP family, rely on DHA for their formation and maintenance. When the body has an inadequate supply of it it relies on trans-fatty acids for NT formation which is grossly inferior to NT/receptor creation using DHA.
DHA is particularly crucial during pregancy in the formation of the infant's brain for the same reasons I just gave.
But that's not all. Policosanol improves HDL/LDL ratios more effectively and to a greater degree than the best available pharmaceuticals.
Niacin lowers BP as much or more than the best pharmaceuticals on the market. Get the flush free niacin.
All of these supplements can be bought at Wal-Mart; among other common outlets. They are perfectly safe and are natural supplements used by the body and found in certain diets.
This isn't common knowledge b/c the pharmaceuticals can't patent this stuff so there's far less profit in researching and marketing it.
Or you can just get Nature Way for even cheaper. It's one of my top vitamin/supplement brands.
Oh yea,
Magnesium and chromium picolinate supplements enhance the bodies ability to effect a healthy insulin response (reduces insulin resistance and improves insulin production). This can be used to help prevent Type 2 Diabetes.
I had heard, but never confirmed, that plain old grapefriut juice will make your blood pressure measure just a tad above dead.
I love the stuff, should probably buy somemore.
DISCLAIMER:
If you are taking prescription meds for HBP, cholesterol, Diabetes, etc. DO NOT take this stuff in large doses without talking to your doctor first. Seriously. Niacin, for example, has a powerful blood pressure reduction effect and you must be careful taking it.
The doctor who does my annual blood work began eating tuna too after he saw the change of before/after in my blood work.
I use The Vitamin Shoppe brand Omega-3 Fish Oil EPA-DHA - in a bottle of 100 softgels. I pay $15.00/bottle in San Diego. They do recommend you take it with a meal, because otherwise you can burp up a very fishy taste.
This product was recommended by my doctor. I also take a cholesterol medication.
I must be weird, I like the flush. Take about 750mg a day.
Right before bedtime. Take of my shirt and look at myself in the bathroom mirror and I look like a lobster!
Out-of-Body Experience? Your Brain Is to Blame
FReepmail me if you want on or off my health and science ping list.
Never heard that about grapefruit. Interesting, though. I didn't believe any of this stuff until my wife showed me the studies and the data. It's amazing how simple it is to correct some of this stuff and how little common knowledge there is about it.
Gingko Biloba concentrates do the same thing as warfarin, the drug used for stroke patients to thin their blood. If you take Gingko you'll notice that you bruise very easily...it's thinning your blood.
Also, antidepressants can be mimicked with 5-HTP supplements, L-Tyrosine and, something recently discovered, a chemical they isolated from St. John's wart. They just found out what that chemical is and now they sell concentrates of it. The natural chemical family found in St. John's wart is called "hyperforins". It's a reuptake inhibitor. Before they made concentrates St. John's didn't work very well b/c the chemical was in such low concentrations that it did little. Now, they've found, these are *better* anti-depressants than the state of the art pharmaceuticals.
That's a pretty stiff dose. Do you take your blood pressure regularly? You could get hypotension if you lower it too much.
BTW,
I can't stand the flush. Makes me think I'm dying!
And the major drug companies are trying to get 'over the counter naturals and herbals' either banned entirely or regulated.
Wonder why that is?
lol
Shameless trawling...
Omega-3 is for ME!
Cheers!
I don't know if you know about pubmed. Just type PUBMED into the address bar of your browser.
Access to literally millions of clinical studies and abstracts.
In most cases, when I've done searches on things that are routinely discounted by the pharma industries, (like policosanol), pubmed shows they are actually effective. In fact very, very effective.
Several online sources have most of these products.
Two that I have used are:
vitaminshoppe.com
swansonvitamins.com
130/77 last time.
Like to get it lower.
Regulation is good, to a point. Some of this stuff they sell is poor quality and misleading. For example, 5-HTP should be served in an enterically coated capsule to be effective. Not all the natural suppliers do that.
And the most recent and biggest discovery I think has to do with what's called resveratrol, which triggers the same reaction caused by the SIRT-2 gene in centenarians: it tells your body to "keep repairing itself and live on", regardless of your current age. Resveratrol appears in abundance in Pinot Noir red wines; the very wines that those fat, sugar, meat eating french folks living to be 100 were consuming. It was called the "French Paradox" b/c they were doing everything doctors tell us not to do - bad food, smoking, etc., yet they were living forever. It was b/c of the high resveratrol content in their wine. Resveratrol, and the SIRT-2 gene, appear to almost completely dominate human health. Everything else appears to just be a band-aid you can apply when the body doesn't repair *itself* by sufficiently strong signalling from SIRT-2 genes. That's just a genetic roll of the dice; either you've got a strong SIRT-2 response or you don't.
But the catch is that it's really hard to 'capture' this chemical in a pill form. Alcohol is a natural preservative for it but in a pill form it breaks down before you consume it. And there are a lot of companies selling worthless resveratrol tablets b/c they are not regulated.
Currently, the only effective way to consume resveratrol and get the 'SIRT effect' is to drink Pinot Noir wines.
So, I think there's good and bad in the regulation issue.
Oh, you're good. Mine's around 110/60 but I'm still a bit young. That's *with* Niacin. Without it's about 130/80.
Heh heh heh, couldn't resist.
;^)
I don't know about this claim, but DON'T take grapefruit juice if you're on a statin drug - it renders it ineffective!
Thanks for the site info, I'll check it out. It has been our (my wife and I) conclusion that you're right. Pharmaceuticals pooh-pooh natural remedies and demand absolute proof; even though the studies for natural remedies are just as strong or stronger than their own studies in pharmaceuticals. But there is *SO* much more money to be made on patented molecules, so I can see why.
How bout silver as an antibiotic? The FDA shoots down anybody who talks about silver.
Meanwhile, silver sulfa topicals are the treatment of choice for burn victims, in large part because it helps ward off infections.
And Curad, the band aid company, recently started marketing bandaids with silver in the pads.
And silver is used in pool filters to keep the water clear.
But listen to the FDA. They know what's good for you.
Heard of it, but haven't delved in as you have.
*Sighs heavily*.
One MORE task for my overburdened reading list.
Thanks for letting me know.
Cheers!
I will have to find some *old* materials and get permission to post them, if I can find them.
About the history of the FDA and how they came to be.
Cheers!
My cardiologist asked me to start taking Omega-3 fish oil capsules the second time I saw him. He's had me on them ever since, along with a compliment of prescription medications that I take for a specific health problem.
It's probably worth mentioning that my doc is one of the top cardiologists at the world famous Methodist Hospital in Houston. Which is sometimes referred to as "Dr. DeBakey's hospital," because of all the magnificent heart work he performed there well into his nineties.
Some people incorrectly assume that doctors at that level automatically reject any and all so-called alternative medicines, diet plans, vitamins, or exercise programs. Not my guy. He doesn't love all of them, nor does he rule all of them out.
Since it was such an odd case, I've made a point to visit some of the top cardiac medicine centers in the world - Stanford Hospital and The Cleveland Clinic. So I'm consulting with some smart, smart cookies.
At first, I was told to supplement my medicine regimine with fish oil pills. However, a bit over a year ago, a study came out that thought it would prove that fish oil pills taken by heart attack sufferers would reduce the risk of tachycardias occuring. But guess what - the study showed that it increased the risk of tachycardia. My top-level docs recommended I stop taking the fish oil right away.
(Tachycardia is the condition when the electrical signals in the heart don't come through clearly, and cause rapid heartbeat or complete electrical confusion. Tachycardias are a risk in heart-attack survivors, because the scar tissue they leave behind can cause electrical malfunctions.)
It's not "nanny state" to expect medical professionals to suggest effective treatment to their patients, especially if the patient is being prescribed something else...just taking things from the health food store isn't a good idea when some can interact with prescription medications.
If it's not something that the drug companies can benefit from, it's not used in American hospitals. You can get terrific fish oil products at good supplement stores, along with Co-Enzyme-Q10, bee pollen, and flax oil. Add the usual Ester-C, B-complex, a little bit of (natural) E once in a while, and take aspirin-81 every other day and you'll feel like a million bucks. I also take an A&D ge-cap and a zinc lozenge once in a while. I cannot remember the last time I had a cold or was sick. Years.
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