Participants: Don Mackintosh, George Guthrie
Series Code: HFAL
Program Code: HFAL000131
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00:46 Hello and welcome to "Health for a Lifetime"
00:48 I'm your host Don Mackintosh 00:49 We're glad you've joined us today! 00:50 We're going to be talking about a big word - CHOLESTEROL 00:53 and here to help us with that big word is Dr. George Guthrie 00:58 He is the physician at the "Lifestyle Center of America" 01:01 in Oklahoma and he has practiced medicine for many years, 01:05 about 14 years in the area of family practice that is 01:08 dealing with all kinds of things in the family 01:10 including cholesterol... 01:11 And also, he has been an instructor, 01:14 and also taught medical students about nutrition, 01:18 and a lot of interesting things, really. 01:20 We're glad that you are with us Dr. Guthrie 01:21 Glad to be here, Don 01:23 And we're going to be talking today about cholesterol, 01:25 and you know, many people here in this particular culture 01:28 and in many Western cultures, 01:30 and perhaps even around the world, have heard a lot about 01:32 cholesterol over the last few years... 01:34 But I have to say that a lot of people are still 01:36 kind of confused about what that all means, 01:38 and so we want to talk about it today. 01:40 What IS cholesterol? 01:43 Oh, that is an interesting question. 01:46 I like to describe it like this... 01:47 Water and oil or grease do not mix very well. 01:54 You know that, you see the puddle when it rains, 01:56 and then a little oil floating on top. 01:58 Showing the little rainbows. Sure! 02:00 Our bodies are water systems. 02:02 We drink water, we urinate water, 02:05 70-80% of our body is water! Take showers in water. 02:09 Okay, inside and outside! 02:11 So it's a water system, YET grease, oil, fat 02:15 are necessary for the body to function. 02:18 Many people do not know that all living cells are 02:22 differentiated one from another by a layer of FAT. 02:27 In our culture today, we are so low-fat everything, 02:30 we fail to recognize that we need some of that stuff. 02:33 So we need a little bit of oil to go with the water. 02:35 Need a little bit of oil to move around within our, 02:38 in essence, water system. 02:40 Now, if you were to get GREASE on your pants... 02:43 Well, let's not do that but let's just 02:45 think about the possibility of that. 02:47 My guess is you would take them off, 02:49 put them in the washing machine and turn the water on. 02:52 Yeah, or someone else would. Okay 02:54 So the water goes in and you expect the grease or oil 02:57 to come out of your pants BECAUSE you add something called 03:01 "SOAP" 03:02 Soap or detergent. 03:05 In essence, soap or detergent ALLOWS 03:07 fat to mix with the water environment. 03:12 It's helpful for me to recognize cholesterol as soap. 03:17 Okay... cholesterol is soap 03:18 When you HEAR cholesterol, 03:20 THINK soap! 03:22 All right, I'm thinking "soap" 03:24 I have a big bar of soap in my mind. 03:26 Now, you may remember that from the Framingham Study, 03:32 on the East Coast, we came to recognize 03:36 that cholesterol is associated with increased heart attack risk 03:40 And so our goal was to DECREASE the cholesterol in our blood. 03:45 Take the soap out! 03:46 Take the soap... Okay take the soap out 03:49 if we're going to put it that way. All right 03:50 But we didn't understand it that way at that time. 03:52 We said, "Well, if we're going to get rid of the cholesterol 03:55 in our blood, what we need to do is 03:57 to STOP eating cholesterol. " 04:00 Stop eating, soap! 04:01 Okay, stop eating the SOAP. 04:04 So we focused on removing the cholesterol from our diets. 04:10 Do you know where cholesterol comes from? 04:13 I'm sure there are many substances, 04:15 but I'm going to guess that it comes from 04:17 animal sources instead of plant sources. Right! 04:20 One of the ways you can tell the difference 04:21 between animal and plants is 04:23 whether or not they MAKE cholesterol. 04:25 Indeed, animals make cholesterol; 04:29 plants do NOT make cholesterol. 04:32 So in our search to try to remove cholesterol from our diet 04:36 ...We said, well we need to cut back on eating the 04:38 animal products because they have cholesterol in them. 04:41 Well people did this! 04:42 They moved towards a vegetarian diet, 04:45 and then they checked their cholesterol again, 04:47 and they found that it was STILL elevated. 04:50 They forgot something VERY important. 04:53 What was that? 04:55 We're animals TOO. 04:57 Our bodies can actually make the soap that we need. 05:01 We don't need to eat any of it. 05:03 We DON'T need to eat any of it because 05:05 our bodies make the soap or cholesterol themselves. 05:12 Are there any plant sources that have cholesterol in them? 05:16 One of the ways you can tell the DIFFERENCE 05:18 between an animal and a plant is whether or not 05:21 they have cholesterol in them. 05:23 Trick question... Do coconuts have cholesterol in them? 05:28 If it's a trick question, I'm going to say, yes! 05:34 I heard on the RADIO that coconuts 05:36 have cholesterol in them. Oh, you did? 05:37 But they don't. They don't... No 05:39 They are, in essence, a plant 05:41 and plants don't have cholesterol in them. 05:44 Okay, so NO cholesterol in coconuts, 05:46 even if you listen to this program on the radio. 05:48 That's correct! 05:51 So, well we talked a little bit about it, 05:54 it's kind of like soap. 05:56 It doesn't mix but we do need a little bit of cholesterol, 05:59 and our body makes everything we need. 06:03 It will make all the soap that we need... yes 06:06 Well then how do we LOWER it if it's too high? 06:09 Well since our own bodies will make the soap or cholesterol, 06:15 then we need to avoid those things that actually 06:19 cause our own body to MAKE the soap or cholesterol. 06:23 Now, the strongest stimulus for that is something 06:27 called "saturated fat" 06:31 Is that one of those long words you've heard of before? 06:33 I don't know, we need to talk about some of these big words 06:36 because that's where I think people will get confused. 06:38 So you're saying... if you add the saturated fat to your diet, 06:42 that can really increase your cholesterol. 06:45 Exactly, and indeed, the problem with coconuts is not 06:50 that it has cholesterol in it, 06:51 but coconut has a lot of SATURATED fat in it 06:55 and that SATURATED fat stimulates our own body 06:59 to make a lot of soap or cholesterol. 07:02 Now, what's different about these saturated fats 07:07 that causes such a problem? 07:09 They are long and straight. I see... 07:13 I like to think of them like firewood. 07:17 You see, fats are long, straight carbon chains. 07:20 I know this is sounding awful technical. 07:22 When every hand in that carbon chain is full of hydrogen, 07:27 it is called a saturated fat and it's long and straight. 07:30 If you stack these together, they make a good, tight wad, 07:34 and our bodies need more soap to move them around. 07:38 Have you ever stacked firewood? 07:40 Yeah, I used to be in charge of that. 07:43 Straight sticks are easy to stack. 07:45 If they're bent, the stack will tend to fall over. 07:48 Straight sticks are GOOD when you're stacking firewood 07:51 but straight sticks are BAD when 07:53 you're dealing with the FATS 07:55 because they make these big globs that are 07:57 hard for our body to move around. 07:58 So cholesterol then is kind of like all these 08:00 bars of soap that are all flat and they're all stacked together 08:03 Or the fats are rather. 08:05 The FATS are stacked together 08:06 and our body has to make extra soap - extra cholesterol 08:11 to be able to move those fats around in the 08:14 water environment. 08:16 So that's why we don't want to have saturated fats because 08:18 it's just like putting a big glob of firewood in your body... 08:21 and you can't move it around! 08:22 And it's hard to move around, 08:24 and it stimulates more cholesterol, 08:25 and increases your risk of heart attack. 08:29 Yeah, well you know, many times when people hear 08:31 about this whole subject, 08:33 I think it kind of goes over their head. 08:34 It's kind of like looking at someone's VCR at their house 08:38 or maybe their DVD player and the place that has the sound 08:42 or rather has the date and time on it and it's still blinking. 08:46 ...And it's been blinking ever since they got it 08:48 because they never learned how to use it... 08:50 And sometimes people are like that when it comes to the 08:52 big words associated with high cholesterol... 08:55 Like for instance, "lipids" what does that mean? 08:58 Lipids is just a fancy word for oil or grease. 09:03 In essence, it's the fats in the body. 09:06 When your doctor orders a lipid panel on you, 09:09 draws your blood to find out what the lipids are 09:12 in essence, he's trying to find out about the fats, 09:15 and the fat-related substances like soap or cholesterol. 09:19 Okay, so they are just fats, grease or whatever. 09:22 What are triglycerides? 09:24 Oh now that's another long one, isn't it? 09:26 I like that word! 09:27 "Tri" sounds like tri-cycle, right? Yeah 09:30 So that's 3 and, indeed, triglycerides are just 09:33 3 of those fats tied together at one end with a 09:36 glycerol molecule. 09:38 So that's pretty easy. Yeah 09:39 So why don't they say 3 fats tied together 09:42 with a glycerol molecule. 09:43 I don't know, they use the Latin... triglycerides 09:46 Saturated fats, I already know. 09:48 That's like stacked firewood. 09:49 That's like the, okay - the long-straight, stacked firewood. 09:53 Like big pieces of pretzels. Okay 09:57 What about unsaturated fats? 09:59 Okay, unsaturated fats, physically, are actually bent, 10:05 they're not long and straight. 10:06 It's unsaturated because a couple of the carbons have 10:10 let go of some of the hydrogens. 10:13 So instead of being long and straight now, 10:15 it's actually bent. 10:17 Do you know, you can tell by looking at the fat, 10:20 whether it's long and straight or bent. 10:24 How can you tell that just by looking at it? 10:26 Well if it's on the table and it's long and straight, 10:29 because it's stacked like firewood and sticks together, 10:33 it will hold its shape. 10:35 So like slices of cheese. 10:37 Uhhh - I was thinking more butter... Butter! 10:39 Cheese has some other things in it, 10:41 but butter is a fat that is SATURATED, 10:44 and because it's long and straight, 10:45 at room temperature it will sit there on the table 10:48 and you can actually cut it with a knife and spread it. 10:53 And so then, what about the stuff that's curled up? 10:55 Well the UNsaturated, the bent ones, 10:58 at room temperature on the table turn into oil. 11:01 A good example of that would be olive oil. 11:04 The same length of a carbon chain but this time - bent, 11:08 doesn't stack as well and it turns into an oil. 11:13 Okay and then you said the temperature is something 11:15 about that and the things that we're concerned about 11:18 are things that stack or don't stack at body temperature, 11:21 is that fair to say? 11:22 Well, it's actually the room temperature 11:26 that's the best way to tell... 11:27 But you're right, when those fats that stand up on the table 11:31 get into our body, they tend to stimulate cholesterol 11:35 or soap production much more than those that are bent 11:39 or the oils. 11:40 We've talked about some of these words and 11:42 different things... how low or how high should my 11:46 cholesterol be? 11:48 You know, if you look at your laboratory results, 11:51 it will tell your cholesterol number, 11:53 then it will give you a normal value. 11:55 And it will say - "Get your cholesterol less than 200 mg/dl" 12:01 Have you heard that number before? 12:02 Sure, 200 or 240-something, they used to say. 12:05 It used to be and they've kind of lowered it down to 200 now. 12:09 It's an interesting phenomenon... 12:12 It ends up that cholesterol is not a real good 12:15 way to check to see if you're at risk for heart attack. 12:17 One-third of the people that have heart attacks 12:20 in this country this year 12:21 will do it with cholesterols that are LESS than 200. 12:25 So, that's not a good measure, 12:28 at least the way it's listed there on your laboratory sheet. 12:32 If you want to make SURE, 12:33 you know, 99.9% that you're not going to have 12:36 heart attack, better get that cholesterol down 12:39 less than like 150. 12:42 Wow, so it needs to be REALLY, that's quite a ways down. 12:45 And if it's not, what should you do, right then? 12:47 Should you take medicine until 12:48 you get it down some other way? 12:50 Well it's not quite that simple, 12:52 but certainly I would avoid those long straight fats, 12:56 and find ways to decrease the amount of fats in your blood. 13:01 So cholesterol is different than triglycerides, right? Correct 13:04 And do they measure triglycerides 13:06 somehow in your blood? 13:07 Triglycerides are one of the measurements that 13:09 comes out on the lipid or fat panel that 13:12 the doctor orders on you. 13:14 FAT PANEL? Is that like... 13:16 I'm picturing a plane with a panel. 13:18 What does that mean? 13:20 I was trying to use the doctor lingo - lipid panel. 13:25 And put it up against the words, in essence, 13:29 these are the fats in your blood. 13:31 They are, in essence, equivalent. 13:32 So when they take that blood test, they look at that, 13:34 and they say, "Okay, you got this fat, you got that fat, 13:36 you got the other fat" 13:38 So how low should my triglycerides be? 13:40 It would be best if your triglycerides were 13:42 less than 150 mg/dl 13:45 and that's probably what the lab test will show for you. 13:48 Okay, so we're kind of breaking this down but really, 13:51 most Americans - their cholesterol is too high, 13:53 their triglycerides are too high, right or wrong? Right 13:56 And so that's why we have this real problem with 13:59 heart disease. 14:01 You know, some people have said it changes when you 14:03 expose it to air - is there anything to that? 14:06 What changes? Cholesterol 14:08 Oh you mean as far as oxidized cholesterol? 14:10 Okay, that's kind of a little different issue. 14:14 Oxidized cholesterol in your diet can actually cause 14:17 significant changes in your body. 14:19 There is evidence that cholesterol that has been 14:22 oxidized can cause atherosclerosis 14:24 within a matter of minutes, like 40 or 50 minutes! 14:27 But in order to really make that, 14:29 you need more than just oxygen exposure, 14:32 you also need significant amount of heat 14:34 followed by an acid environment. 14:36 Well, I don't know how to do that, 14:38 but I think some restaurants specialize in that. YES! 14:42 As-a-matter-of-fact, something called "french fries" 14:45 tends to make that happen. 14:46 Okay, because it's really hot and then how does the 14:51 acid come into that? 14:52 Well, when you eat something that's been very hot 14:54 that had cholesterol in it, you drop it into your stomach, 14:56 your stomach makes the acid, 14:58 and then changes actually occur in your stomach 15:01 and that is absorbed and can cause disease directly. 15:04 That is certainly a dietary cholesterol that's of 15:07 great concern. 15:08 Well, there are other things we need to talk about. 15:10 There is LDL, HDL... 15:12 I guess these are all forms of cholesterol or whatnot, 15:15 and we need to talk more about those. Okay 15:17 And figure out what's good, what's bad, what's neither, 15:22 and we want to do that when we come back. 15:24 We've been talking about cholesterol, 15:25 and we hope that you join us when we come back. 15:29 Have you found yourself wishing 15:30 that you could shed a few pounds? 15:32 Have you been on a diet for most of your life, 15:34 but not found anything that will really keep the weight off? 15:37 If you've answered "yes" to any of these questions, 15:40 then we have a solution for you that works! 15:43 Dr. Hans Diehl and Dr. Aileen Ludington 15:46 have written a marvelous booklet called... 15:48 "Reversing Obesity Naturally" 15:50 and we'd like to send it to you FREE of charge. 15:53 Here's a medically sound approach successfully used 15:56 by thousands who were able to eat more, 15:58 and lose weight permanently without feeling guilty 16:01 or hungry through lifestyle medicine. 16:04 Dr. Diehl and Dr. Ludington have been featured on 3ABN 16:07 and in this booklet, they present a sensible approach 16:10 to eating, nutrition and lifestyle changes 16:12 that can help you prevent heart disease, 16:14 diabetes and EVEN cancer. 16:16 Call or write today for your free copy of... 16:19 "Reversing Obesity Naturally" 16:20 and you could be on your way to a healthier, happier YOU! 16:24 It's ABSOLUTELY free of charge, so call or write today. 16:30 Welcome back, we've been talking with Dr. George Guthrie 16:33 We've been talking about CHOLESTEROL! 16:36 And those of you who are watching, 16:37 I know many of you know someone who has a 16:39 high cholesterol... I'm sure YOU don't, 16:41 or maybe you DO. 16:43 We've been talking about what that means, 16:45 how it can be dangerous to us, why it's dangerous, 16:47 how to really explain it in simple terms, 16:50 and helping us with all that is 16:51 Dr. George Guthrie, he is the physician at the 16:54 Lifestyle Center of America in Oklahoma 16:57 What do they do there at the Lifestyle Center? 16:59 Well, we apply lifestyle principles to people who have 17:03 high cholesterol and help them bring those numbers down. 17:07 Risk factors down so they won't have a heart attack, 17:09 and all those different things- do you have good results? 17:12 I think so... we see peoples cholesterol drop when they come; 17:15 their weight comes down, blood sugars tend to improve. 17:18 Okay, we were talking about cholesterol. 17:21 It has an essential role in our body, you said. Yes 17:24 But we make ALL that we need. 17:26 The problem is we're eating a bunch of things 17:28 that have extra cholesterol that we don't need 17:32 and it gums up things? 17:33 It's not so much the cholesterol 17:35 it's that long, straight fat that tends to make our 17:37 OWN body to make the extra 17:39 cholesterol or soap - that's the problem. 17:42 Okay, so we're eating too much 17:44 saturated fat is what you've said; 17:45 the long, straight stackable, sort of like firewood inside... 17:50 and then it stimulates that to make more of it. 17:53 Well, we were talking about that and we want to talk now 17:57 a little bit more about these fat packages in the body, 18:00 and what we can do to maybe get rid of them... 18:02 Or what's good about them or bad about them. 18:04 When your doctor does your lipid panel, 18:07 that is checking the fats in your blood, 18:10 there are some numbers that come back that are often 18:13 confusing to people. 18:14 Maybe you've heard of LDL or HDL; 18:18 people have a hard time understanding these things, 18:21 and I'd like to try to make them, at least, 18:23 somewhat understandable today. 18:24 Okay, let's talk about then LDL 18:26 and see how can you help us understand it. 18:27 Well actually BEFORE LDL, 18:29 to understand how these things work, 18:31 we need to go back to something called "chylomicrons" 18:34 It's not measured on the test, 18:36 and it's a big word that you don't have to remember. 18:38 Chylomicrons - what are those? 18:41 What happens is... we eat the fat, 18:43 it goes down into our stomachs, 18:45 it is absorbed, not into the bloodstream, 18:49 but because these are long, sticky fats that can clog 18:52 things up, it actually goes UP the lymphatic system 18:56 behind the heart and dumps into the blood just before 19:00 it enters the heart. 19:02 These large packages of fat and cholesterol would 19:05 clog things up really bad if they ended up going 19:08 directly to the liver. 19:10 That's the FIRST really PACKAGE, 19:12 again, not generally measured in the blood test, 19:15 but it's fat that's being brought into the body. 19:19 Okay, explain this again... 19:20 Chylomicrons - when you eat a big thing of french fries, 19:25 are those turned into chylomicrons? 19:26 OH BOY - they are! I can tell you... 19:28 And then they go dump right into your heart! 19:30 Right just before the blood goes into the heart, 19:32 and these are BIG FAT globules. 19:35 They go along in your bloodstream until they 19:38 actually run into a place where it's too small... 19:41 And then they start to let the fat go off 19:44 into the tissues around it. 19:46 I saw an electron micrograph several years ago. 19:49 I wish I could find it again, I would love to show you. 19:52 It shows one of these FAT particles in the bloodstream 19:57 and right next to it are some red blood cells. 20:01 They are really small by comparison. 20:03 You know those little tiny red blood cells 20:05 have to fold in 2 to get through the capillaries? 20:08 Can you imagine what the big 20:10 FAT globules do to the circulation? 20:12 They're just smashed in there and they clog everything up. 20:14 They clog everything up and the fat gets 20:16 kind of pushed off into the tissues around. 20:19 It really clogs things up. 20:21 It is one of the reasons why after you eat a FATTY meal 20:23 your brain feels so fuzzy... 20:25 And people even tell me their joints hurt afterwards. 20:28 It's the poor circulation from all that fat 20:31 coming into the system. 20:32 So if someone is eating a BIG HUGE KING size thing of fries 20:36 right now, what would you recommend? 20:37 STOP! 20:40 But that's interesting... 20:42 The body thinks the heart can 20:43 handle a little bit better than the liver. 20:45 Because if it went right into the liver, 20:46 it would just blow it up! 20:48 It would blow it up, it would clog it up, 20:50 and could actually kill people. 20:52 I read an article about a man who took the restaurant 20:56 fare of one of the BIG HUGE fast food restaurant chains 21:01 and ate it for 30 days. 21:02 It just came out and he had to check himself into the hospital. 21:05 He has all kinds of problems, 21:07 and he ate JUST THAT for 30 days. 21:09 Just to kind of prove that it wasn't good for you? 21:11 That's kind of interesting! 21:13 So anyway, then there is this BIG, 21:14 HUGE, FLAT - not flat but FAT globule 21:18 that you've talked about - that's one thing. 21:22 What's the next thing you wanted to mention to us. 21:23 Well the fat is taken out of those and kind of the 21:25 remnants of it go around and end up at the liver. 21:28 The liver ends up being Grand Central Station 21:30 for managing all kinds of food... 21:32 Cleaning it out.. Well, changing it, adjusting it, 21:36 changing fats to sugars or sugars to fats, 21:38 whatever the body needs... 21:40 The liver is kind of Grand Central Station 21:41 So the liver takes those remnants, 21:44 and any fat that it may have made, 21:47 and turns around and puts it out in a particle called, 21:51 "VLDL" or very low density lipoprotein. 21:56 So it makes it good when it was bad. 21:58 No, it's STILL bad. It's still BAD. 22:00 It's full of fat - it's like the one that came from the stomach, 22:02 but it's distributing it around the body... I SEE! 22:06 Now these globules go out just like the chylomicrons did, 22:10 and get stuck in the small blood vessels and the fat is 22:12 left out or LET out. 22:14 What's LEFT when the fat comes out is this thing 22:18 that we call "LDL" 22:20 And it's measured in your lipid panel in your blood test. 22:23 The LDL is actually more responsible for your having 22:30 a heart attack than just the cholesterol level. 22:34 These are the very worst ones. 22:36 Someone said they are called, "lousy" 22:38 Okay, sometimes it's hard to remember the names 22:41 and one of the things that I like to do 22:43 to make it a little easier to remember is to call them 22:45 "little devil lipoproteins" They're really BAD! 22:49 They are really bad, so we want to get those 22:51 as low as possible... 22:53 But what you're saying is, 22:54 even before they're able to be MEASURED, 22:56 those chylomicrons are already in the blood, 22:59 and they are already wreaking havoc. 23:01 That comes from the meal, that's right, 23:04 and the LDLs are actually coming from the liver. 23:07 But both of them are, in essence, globs of FAT 23:10 and cholesterol that are moving around in the bloodstream. 23:13 So then what is HDL? 23:14 Ahhh, if we think of chylomicrons as the 23:18 delivery system, and we think of 23:20 LDLs as the distribution system for cholesterol and fat, 23:24 HDLs are the GARBAGE COLLECTION SYSTEM! 23:28 In essence, the HDLs are in charge of going out 23:32 gathering the extra cholesterol, the waste cholesterol, 23:35 the waste soap, bringing it back to the liver 23:38 for recycling. 23:39 Now it so happens that the HIGHER the HDL, 23:43 the LOWER your risk of heart attack. 23:46 You body is recirculating the stuff, 23:50 bringing it back for recycling! 23:52 Now that's the word I was looking for. 23:53 So then the LDL is really bad and you want to get it low, 23:56 but the HDL - you want to get it UP! 23:57 You'd really like to have it UP! 23:59 And the higher you get it, why the better off you are. 24:03 Because it's out there mopping up 24:04 all the junk that's in your system. Sure 24:07 So what's another name for HDL? 24:09 Do you have a pet name for that? Oh yeah... 24:11 I've got a pet name for HDL too. What's that? 24:12 There's the "little devils," those are the bad ones. 24:14 And the HDLs are the... are you ready? 24:16 "Heavenly darlings" 24:19 You want those as high as you can get them. NICE - nice! 24:22 So what's the best way to... I assume then a good thing to do 24:25 would be to really seek to RAISE the HDL. Right 24:29 So what's the best way to do that? 24:30 Well, there are several things people can do to raise the HDL 24:34 One of those is to exercise. 24:35 I think you have a graphic on this. 24:37 Okay - exercise. 24:38 Exercise, then DECREASE the amount of stress in your life. 24:43 Now, I don't particularly care for the decreasing the stress 24:47 because of a lot of people respond differently to stress. 24:51 I like to say it this way... 24:53 A positive thankful attitude tends to help the HDL come down. 24:57 Of course it would be helpful to help the HDL go up. 25:01 Another thing that is beneficial is estrogen. 25:05 And there are some of us who don't have that advantage. 25:08 The HDL in ladies tend to be higher. 25:12 And uh, let's see, there were... 25:17 Stop smoking? YES! 25:18 That's right, you could stop smoking! 25:20 Because smoking tends to depress the HDLs. 25:23 Okay, so estrogen, stop smoking, 25:24 and have a thankful attitude. 25:26 And if you could do it all at the same time, 25:27 it's probably better. Oh yes 25:29 Except us males, we don't take the estrogen. 25:32 Okay, so what's the best number we should look at 25:35 in terms of telling us then what our cardiac risk is 25:38 or our risk of dying from a heart attack? 25:40 If you're looking at just the LDL, 25:43 we want that number less than 100 25:45 Then they're arguing now, maybe it would be better 25:47 to have it LESS than 80 25:49 But the truth is, the total cholesterol 25:52 is not the best number. 25:53 The truth is the LDL cholesterol is not the best number. 25:59 And the HDL number are not the best way of telling... 26:03 The BEST way to check is actually use a ratio... 26:05 That's the total cholesterol divided by the heavenly darlings 26:10 and if that ratio is less than 4 26:13 you can pretty much say the cholesterol in your arteries 26:18 is not worsening. 26:20 If you can get that ratio less than 3, 26:23 you're actually taking the cholesterol off the walls 26:26 and decreasing your risk. 26:27 People that are watching that are total vegetarian; 26:32 that means they have no animal products at all, 26:34 do they have to worry about this at all? 26:35 Yes. As-a-matter-of-fact they do. 26:38 Because the fats they eat, those long straight ones, 26:41 the saturated fats can RAISE their cholesterol 26:45 EVEN if they're eating only plants, 26:47 and avoiding any animal products 26:49 which have the cholesterol or soap in them. 26:51 So if they're just eating coconuts... they're in trouble. 26:55 Especially just coconut oil. 26:57 I think God put something in the coconut that may help 27:00 to protect against some of these problems, 27:02 but certainly when they pull the saturated fat out of the 27:05 coconut and then put it in things we eat, 27:07 it's likely to make us worse. 27:09 So what's the BEST thing for us to eat, 27:11 just real quickly in the next 30 seconds? 27:13 What would we EAT to AVOID this, 27:15 and REVERSE the problem if we do have high cholesterol? 27:18 A plant-based diet is generally best. 27:21 The fats, when they're mixed with the food itself, 27:24 don't seem to stimulate the soap production 27:27 or cholesterol production in our body, 27:28 and the plants have other protective elements that 27:31 help decrease inflammation in the body 27:33 which is also important, help to lower the LDL 27:36 and to raise the HDL. 27:39 Guess you can't really improve on God's method 27:42 with foods as grown, can you? That's correct 27:44 You've been watching "Health for a Lifetime" 27:46 and we've attempted to make the complex 27:49 a little more simple today. 27:50 We hope it has been helpful to you, 27:52 and we hope that as a result of today's program, 27:54 you have Health that lasts for a Lifetime! |
Revised 2014-12-17