BBC: Cholesterol genes 'protect heart'

BBC ^ | Wednesday, 18 June 2008 02:27 UK 01:27 GMT, | BBC Staff

[RightOnTheLeftCoast]

"Atkins would’ve probably saved his life."

Yes. And the weight loss would've been a bonus.

Atkins was a cardiologist, and well into his career noticed that excessive carb intake was a frequent theme in his patients. Too many folks have developed insulin intolerance, myself included. A nice fat sandwich or a Coke sets the pancreas into overdrive, and the result is arterial inflammation. The plaques are band-aids. Potentially fatal ones.

[dfwgator]

Eat lots of fats.

Qualify that statement. I get most of my fats from consuming nuts, especially pistachios.

[kmiller1k]

I am currently re-reading the Schwarzbein Principle for the fourth time just to get fine tuning on my diet. Dr S advocates a high protein diet with plenty of real fats. With some good carbs thrown in. She is an endocrinologist who treated diabetics who weren’t getting any better following the Am Diabetic Asso diet of high carb, low fat diet.

Those that eat low fat, low protein diets are depriving their bodies of essential nutrients that mediate hormones—insulin being a very important one and one that I think we are finding is linked to CVD in an important way.

[RightOnTheLeftCoast]

"Those that eat low fat, low protein diets are depriving their bodies of essential nutrients..."

Yes. What many uninformed critics of low-carb diets neglect is that you can live quite well on a zero carb diet. But a zero fat diet will kill you. Atkins noted that almost uniformly, his cardiac patients who were on stringent low-fat diets were in terrible shape, very run-down. Besides taking their carb intake down several notches and ensuring they consumed plenty of fats, he'd supplement them with essential fatty acids.

Fats are essential for nutrient transport, cell membrane function and immune response. There are some very unhealthful fats (hydrogenated fats are basically arterial plaque in a can), but go ahead and load up on the olive oil and nut oils!

[isrul]

Yeah. But god help you if you need surgery and have to stop the regimen.