High Cholesterol

[smittysbar]

Had my blood work done Monday, get a call from the doctors office at 5:30 stating they need to talk to me ASAP, but would not tell me what about. SOB's had me thinking the worst all night, BS to say the least.

Ended up being high cholesterol, and when I say high I mean like 740's. I am 32, seems like something could be off, but they are giving me meds and told me to diet for 3 months and would check again.

Anyone dealt with this shit before? I know I need to get back in shape. Don't like salads, or much fruit. Any advise would be great.

[Silock]

Originally Posted by DaKCMan AP

Explain people who live in other countries, eat more of a plant-based whole foods diet and have much better cholesterol scores than Americans. Then explain how those same people who then move to the US, adopt an American diet and have their cholesterol levels rise to US numbers.

Originally Posted by Metrolike

Explain people improving cholesterol levels by eating more fiber rich foods and less cholesterol rich foods respectively? I'm pretty sure both (genes and diet) play a large role.

The problem is that cholesterol scores do not differentiate between the cholesterol produced by the body and cholesterol from food. So, eating food with less cholesterol may improve scores. It also may not. People that eat low cholesterol food may have good scores. They may have bad scores. People with bad diets may have bad scores and may also have good scores. The thing is that the score itself is simply a total of the HDL (good), LDL (bad) and triglycerides.

So, while one might have a good "score," they still might have low levels of HDL. That's not very good. Conversely, one might have a bad score because they have a lot of HDL in their system. The total score itself isn't very useful.

Again, I'm not saying that diet has no effect. It absolutely does. The foods you eat can have very long-term post-prandial effects, which can negatively influence scores by creating artificially high triglyceride count that may not be present all the time. You can also use your diet to get more beneficial levels of HDL.

I'm simply saying that eating cholesterol isn't going to cause your body to start magically producing all bad cholesterol with none of the good. That's genetics. Sometimes, a person can do all the dietary things possible to get a good "score" and still have too much LDL and/or triglycerides.

[Chiefshrink]

Start taking "Red Yeast Rice". You can get it at Wal-Mart. My wife used to have high cholesterol(high LDL) until she started taking this stuff. The doctors wanted her to take all this medication but she was resistent and wanted to try the natural route first(ala Red Yeast Rice). She has never looked back. It will lower your LDL significantly within 2mos.

[BigOlChiefsfan]

Silock's link to the heartscan blog is 'my online cardiac guru' the guy knows his stuff.

I quit eating much wheat after I got my last checkup, based on the info from the site above. Not for everyone, but it turns out if your body is having trouble (and displaying said trouble in 'bad numbers' one way for some people to improve their numbers is to go wheat free. Want more info on this? Follow the link and read up.

A few more tidbits - it sounds like they will probably try to put you on a Statin drug. If you decide to take a statin, be sure you also take an over-the-counter pill called Co-enzyme Q10 (CoQ10 on the label). It's the 'building block' of muscle/the heart and is depleted by statin drugs and is the reason a lot of people get serious muscle pain when taking statin drugs (not to mention CHF). It's not the cheapest OTC pill, I buy mine @ Costco in bulk and I'd advise anyone on a Statin to take 100mg daily, more if needed to prevent aches. I don't take a statin drug, but I do take CoQ10 (currently 50mg). It's a prescription drug in Japan for heart issues. You can -and probably should - buy it at Sam's or Costco. In my case, it's really helped my dental health as well. 100% better w/this stuff in my system.

I notice they're going to give you 'some kind of fish oil'. It's basically a prescription fish oil pill, it contains the same thing that the Costco Fish oil includes but they get to charge you a ton of money for the prescription, and take fewer pills. If you have great insurance...mazel tov. Otherwise, consider eating fish oil like it was going out of style. Your doctor probably won't think highly of 'plain fish oil' because there is no fish oil salesman coming into his office and showing him the benefits of cheap, over the counter drugs like the drug company will send. I don't have a 'cadillac' insurance plan, I have a Yugo plan. "You got no money so you go figure this shit out for yourself, hillbilly". So I take 4 or more per day of Costco fish oil and they help. If you find yourself getting 'fish oil burp' they sell coated pills @ Costco, or just put your fish oil pills in the freezer.

Eat oats daily, they'll help lower your numbers. I like the Irish style steel cut oats, I mix in some oat bran as well. Throw in some berries, frozen or dried blueberries or whatever berry is in season.

I take slo-niacin, 2 of the 500mg pills (from Costco) nightly. It causes your skin to 'flush' or turn reddish as you get used to it - this passes in time. I take a daily aspirin, and I take it w/the niacin, cuts down on the skin-flush. Taking it at night, the flush is just as likely to happen when I'm asleep. This pill raises HDL and lowers your triglycerides. But if you plan to take niacin you really should exercise. Niacin can raise blood sugar and you don't need glucose issues on top of everything. The way niacin leaves the body is basically thru sweat, so in order to keep from having too much of this in the body, work up a sweat daily. The 'no-flush' niacin won't help, so don't bother with it.

Eating fish will be touted. The 'upper food chain' fish can indeed have some heavy metal issues and you may not want more than 1 serving of salmon per week. I eat a lot of kippered herring and sardines. The kippers are heavily smoked, they remind me of 'fishy bacon' and I sometimes hide them in German potato salad. Don't knock it til you try it.

I have friends who take the red yeast rice, it's not 'good for what ails me' per se, so I take a pass.

With numbers as high as yours, be aware that your liver may not be all it can be. You might want to lay off booze for a while if you drink, and you can take something called 'milk thistle' or it's active ingredient Silymarin. Helps heal the liver up, and the liver and your cholesterol are intertwined. Milk Thistle was 'the drinking man's friend' in my younger days.

Good luck, remember that you may have to learn to 'eat to live', so even if you don't like X,Y or Z...try thinking of it as 'funky medicine' instead of sardines, or whatever.

[HemiEd]

Originally Posted by MahiMike

I think you heard wrong. 740 is the equivalent of running a temp of 120. Cholesterol is a farce anyway. It was invented by the AMA to sell you drugs. Whatever you do, stay off the statins.

I have been on statins for more than two years, is there something wrong with me that I don't know about?

Lots of opinions, I know.

[smittysbar]

Okay picked up prescription, they gave me GEMFIBROZIL - Generic for LOPID, and 21st century Fish oil 1000mg.

Anyone on this, or been on this?

[Brock]

The fish oil might make for some smelly burps. The other stuff I've never heard of.

[BIG_DADDY]

Originally Posted by smittysbar

Okay picked up prescription, they gave me GEMFIBROZIL - Generic for LOPID, and 21st century Fish oil 1000mg.

Anyone on this, or been on this?

For the life of me I don't know why they don't use krill. Profits I'm sure.

[BIG_DADDY]

Originally Posted by BigOlChiefsfan

Silock's link to the heartscan blog is 'my online cardiac guru' the guy knows his stuff.

I quit eating much wheat after I got my last checkup, based on the info from the site above. Not for everyone, but it turns out if your body is having trouble (and displaying said trouble in 'bad numbers' one way for some people to improve their numbers is to go wheat free. Want more info on this? Follow the link and read up.

A few more tidbits - it sounds like they will probably try to put you on a Statin drug. If you decide to take a statin, be sure you also take an over-the-counter pill called Co-enzyme Q10 (CoQ10 on the label). It's the 'building block' of muscle/the heart and is depleted by statin drugs and is the reason a lot of people get serious muscle pain when taking statin drugs (not to mention CHF). It's not the cheapest OTC pill, I buy mine @ Costco in bulk and I'd advise anyone on a Statin to take 100mg daily, more if needed to prevent aches. I don't take a statin drug, but I do take CoQ10 (currently 50mg). It's a prescription drug in Japan for heart issues. You can -and probably should - buy it at Sam's or Costco. In my case, it's really helped my dental health as well. 100% better w/this stuff in my system.

I notice they're going to give you 'some kind of fish oil'. It's basically a prescription fish oil pill, it contains the same thing that the Costco Fish oil includes but they get to charge you a ton of money for the prescription, and take fewer pills. If you have great insurance...mazel tov. Otherwise, consider eating fish oil like it was going out of style. Your doctor probably won't think highly of 'plain fish oil' because there is no fish oil salesman coming into his office and showing him the benefits of cheap, over the counter drugs like the drug company will send. I don't have a 'cadillac' insurance plan, I have a Yugo plan. "You got no money so you go figure this shit out for yourself, hillbilly". So I take 4 or more per day of Costco fish oil and they help. If you find yourself getting 'fish oil burp' they sell coated pills @ Costco, or just put your fish oil pills in the freezer.

Eat oats daily, they'll help lower your numbers. I like the Irish style steel cut oats, I mix in some oat bran as well. Throw in some berries, frozen or dried blueberries or whatever berry is in season.

I take slo-niacin, 2 of the 500mg pills (from Costco) nightly. It causes your skin to 'flush' or turn reddish as you get used to it - this passes in time. I take a daily aspirin, and I take it w/the niacin, cuts down on the skin-flush. Taking it at night, the flush is just as likely to happen when I'm asleep. This pill raises HDL and lowers your triglycerides. But if you plan to take niacin you really should exercise. Niacin can raise blood sugar and you don't need glucose issues on top of everything. The way niacin leaves the body is basically thru sweat, so in order to keep from having too much of this in the body, work up a sweat daily. The 'no-flush' niacin won't help, so don't bother with it.

Eating fish will be touted. The 'upper food chain' fish can indeed have some heavy metal issues and you may not want more than 1 serving of salmon per week. I eat a lot of kippered herring and sardines. The kippers are heavily smoked, they remind me of 'fishy bacon' and I sometimes hide them in German potato salad. Don't knock it til you try it.

I have friends who take the red yeast rice, it's not 'good for what ails me' per se, so I take a pass.

With numbers as high as yours, be aware that your liver may not be all it can be. You might want to lay off booze for a while if you drink, and you can take something called 'milk thistle' or it's active ingredient Silymarin. Helps heal the liver up, and the liver and your cholesterol are intertwined. Milk Thistle was 'the drinking man's friend' in my younger days.

Good luck, remember that you may have to learn to 'eat to live', so even if you don't like X,Y or Z...try thinking of it as 'funky medicine' instead of sardines, or whatever.

Use iherb.com dude.

[BigOlChiefsfan]

When you don't know much about a medicine, look it up online and find out for yourself what it does, what the side effects are. I start here:

webmd

Here's some generic info on cholestorol meds

The family of drugs that it belongs to

Long story short, this does the same job that my slo-niacin does. Get busy with it, but if your insurance ever runs out keep in mind that slo-niacin, beaucoup fish oil + a lot of vitamin D (I take 6000mg of D3 daily) and daily exercise are the poor mans cardiac cocktail. Best of luck to you.

[matts22]

Originally Posted by smittysbar

Had my blood work done Monday, get a call from the doctors office at 5:30 stating they need to talk to me ASAP, but would not tell me what about. SOB's had me thinking the worst all night, BS to say the least.

Ended up being high cholesterol, and when I say high I mean like 740's. I am 32, seems like something could be off, but they are giving me meds and told me to diet for 3 months and would check again.

Anyone dealt with this shit before? I know I need to get back in shape. Don't like salads, or much fruit. Any advise would be great.

Originally Posted by smittysbar

Okay picked up prescription, they gave me GEMFIBROZIL - Generic for LOPID, and 21st century Fish oil 1000mg.

Anyone on this, or been on this?

Do you remember if your triglycerides were high?

All you mentioned in your first post was total cholesterol, which factors in triglycerides, LDL, and HDL (good cholesterol). Both of the medications that you were given are more for triglycerides. They have very little to no effect on lowering LDL (the bad cholesterol), and total cholesterol won't change much unless your triglycerides were really high.

Are you sure that the "740" was for total cholesterol?
Do you remember the doctor talking about your LDL (bad cholesterol) number? If so, do you remember the number, or if it was high or low?
Are those the only two meds that he gave you?

[cabletech94]

My bad cholesterol was in the 700s a couple years back.
It's a wakeup call when your doctor looks at you and asks if you want to die?
I was 25. Yeah. It's true.
I've lowered it down to the higher 200s now and am on a few meds for it.
If you're taking fish oil geltabs, take it right before bed. Almost don't notice an aftertaste as opposed to takin' them first thing in the morning.

[BigOlChiefsfan]

"How to drop your cholesterol like a stone"

http://www.healthcentral.com/cholest...986/14814/drop

[Sure-Oz]

I just got a call today saying i need to get on meds right away...

I started eating and exercising last week and had a blood test yesterday. Should i worry, i plan to eat way healthier and exercise from here on out. When i say worry, i plan to do the 'right' things from here on out

[Pants]

Originally Posted by Sure-Oz

I just got a call today saying i need to get on meds right away...

I started eating and exercising last week and had a blood test yesterday. Should i worry, i plan to eat way healthier and exercise from here on out. When i say worry, i plan to do the 'right' things from here on out

What was your score?

P.S. has anyone heard from smitty?

[Sure-Oz]

Originally Posted by Metrolike

What was your score?

P.S. has anyone heard from smitty?

278, puting me on senastat? i couldnt hear what the nurse said but all basics diet.

im kinda scared, im used to health issues but not this. I think the last year has killed me ive eaten so bad and gained about 30lbs overall.

They told me < than 200 is what i need to have