Cholesterol Levels

I couldn't believe your answer to the controlling granny who wants to feed her grandkids ramen soup despite the parents' objections that it's salty. You said healthy kids won't be harmed. She will, no doubt, wave this under her daughter-in-law's nose.Why not toss the seasoning packet and substitute a light broth made from real chicken? I am the kind of grandmother who respects the boundaries set by my daughter and son-in-law while bonding lovingly with my grandchildren. Don't you know it's not about noodles?

My doctor has advised me to take medication to lower my cholesterol, which has always been around 280 despite plenty of exercise and a low-fat diet. Why should I start on a drug when at age 55 I have no symptoms of heart disease, my electrocardiogram is normal, and there are significant risks, side effects and costs of medications to lower cholesterol?There are two reasons why you should follow your doctor's advice:1. Population studies have shown that men with cholesterol levels like yours have a three times greater risk of dying of a heart attack than men with cholesterol levels around 200.2.

This summer my father committed suicide. After his death we became aware of the possibility that his death might have been related to a little-known side effect of a medication he took to lower his cholesterol.My father began taking Zocor two years ago. Prior to that he had never been depressed.I have since met a patient who can directly attribute the start of depression with beginning on Zocor and its end with stopping the drug. Depression is listed as a possible side effect of Zocor but only in the fine print of a full page of information.

Americans have a passion for trying to fix things with a pill. Many millions take pills daily to lower their blood pressure or their cholesterol levels.Millions more swallow vitamins and minerals and "nutritional" supplements in the hope of remaining healthy or slowing the progress of disease. And many believe that the pills will somehow render them immune to the damage wrought by unhealthy habits.But others have an aversion to medications or fear their current and possible future side effects, especially drugs that must be taken daily for decades to prevent a health problem that may or may not develop.

The anti-cholesterol bandwagon has been picking up steam for decades. People have been bludgeoned into believing that margarine is better than butter, eggs are evil and that beef is a bad word. Everyone was encouraged to get total cholesterol below 200. If diet didn't work, drugs were often prescribed.But now a new study has created confusion. Researchers have discovered that in older people, cholesterol doesn't seem to count. Their subjects were over 70 and had not had a heart attack. Cholesterol levels were not associated with rates of heart attack or risk of death.

Physicians in London are saying that cholesterol tests are unreliable indicators of who is at risk for heart disease.Based on a 20-year study of nearly 22,000 London men, doctors at the Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine are to conclude in today's issue of the medical journal Lancet that repeated, carefully executed cholesterol tests are only mildy predictive of heart disease problems because most people in Western society have cholesterol levels that...

Q: I am taking medication for high cholesterol and wonder whether my 7-year-old son should have his cholesterol checked.A: Many pediatricians include a measurement of cholesterol as one of their standard blood tests. If the pediatrician hasn't already done so, have your son's cholesterol checked in the near future. There is about a 50 percent chance that your son also has high cholesterol, which can be inherited by half the offspring of an affected father or mother.You should be aware that the cholesterol value is considered abnormal at lower levels in children than in adults.

Older men who receive injections of the male hormone testosterone can increase their muscle size and lower their cholesterol levels. That's the good news from a study recently published in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism.All men go through a sort of menopause, although it is far more gradual than that experienced by women.From age 50 to 70, a man's blood level of testosterone drops more than 40 percent. He becomes less assertive, loses muscle and bone mass, gains fat, doesn't want to have sex as often and finds it far more difficult to attain and maintain an erection.

DALLAS -- For people trying to control their cholesterol levels, eating right is usually not enough. They also have to get up off that couch, start exercising and lose weight, according to new federal guidelines.The recommendations are the first revision of the landmark 1988 report on cholesterol that created the craze for butter substitutes and nonfat foods. Both sets of guidelines were crafted by the National Cholesterol Education Program, a 25-member panel now headed by Dallas researcher Dr. Scott Grundy.

Patient, test thyself.The expanding world of home medical tests is making it easier for us to monitor and maintain our own bodies. Kits are available now over the counter that can check blood sugar, look for colon cancer, test blood pressure, detect urinary tract infections, determine cholesterol levels and discover pregnancy -- as well as the best time of month to make it happen.The benefits of home testing are clear, physicians say. An early awareness of pregnancy can translate into better prenatal care.

Keith Miller leads what doctors call a healthy, active lifestyle. The suburban Baltimore teenager has always loved sports and plays soccer competitively. He avoids eating pizza and junk food. But despite all that, Miller had cholesterol levels nearly five times his average peer and underwent a double bypass surgery to repair his heart two years ago when he was 15. Though open-heart surgery remains unusual in young patients, medical experts fear that cholesterol levels are rising at an alarming rate.

Health risks abound in modern life. But are the decisions we make to preserve our health supported by solid science? Not always. As a result, it's become more challenging than ever to make informed choices about prevention and treatment. Consider the recent clinical trial demonstrating that the cholesterol-lowering drug Zetia (and a drug that contains it, Vytorin) does not effectively reduce fatty deposits in arteries. These findings raise doubts and concerns about a basic tenet in medicine: Lowering cholesterol will lower the incidence of heart disease.

My face looked like a dry, glazed doughnut for eight years, until I read your column about using milk of magnesia on the face and scalp. My dermatologist had been treating my scalp, but I got nowhere. Both problems disappeared after one application of MoM. Milk of magnesia (magnesium hydroxide aka MoM) has been used for more than a century as an oral laxative. More recently, we have heard from readers that if this chalky liquid is applied to underarms, it acts as a deodorant. Someone else told us that topical applications of milk of magnesia on the face while showering could be effective for flakes.

In a season of ritual overeating, Johns Hopkins researchers have come up with another reason for men to watch their diets: Low cholesterol might protect them from the most aggressive form of prostate cancer. This isn't the first time medical researchers have linked fats to cancer and its consequences. Recent studies have linked obesity to higher death rates from several types of cancer, and a previous Hopkins study found that men on cholesterol-lowering drugs were less likely to develop fast-growing prostate tumors.

I heard that there was a study about possible bad effects of low cholesterol in children. I am concerned about this because my teenagers have cholesterol levels of 103 and 110. What were the problems? I would like to know where this was published so I can share it with their pediatrician. For years, there have been puzzling reports that low cholesterol levels may be associated with impulsive and violent behavior in adults. Animal studies (in dogs and monkeys) have also found a link between low cholesterol and aggressive behavior.

I took Lipitor for about eight months. One morning, I awoke to pain in my neck, upper back, shoulders and arms. In addition, my arms are much weaker than before. The pain has been diagnosed as peripheral neuropathy. The only time I feel good is when I lie in a tub of hot water. Most of my life, I had a great memory, but I've become very forgetful. I start a sentence and then forget what I want to say. I also feel depressed, just the opposite of my usual demeanor. I cannot tolerate these side effects and would like some other way to lower my cholesterol.

THE BENEFITS OF BARLEY For the sake of your health, go with the grain. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's new food guidelines urge Americans to eat more whole grains, and a new study by USDA scientists in Beltsville finds that eating foods made from barley can help reduce cholesterol levels. The study by researchers at the Human Nutrition Research Center found that men and women who ate as little as 3 grams of barley a day could see drops in their cholesterol levels. Those who ate as much as 9 grams a day saw their cholesterol levels drop more than 13 percent.

When does a diet supplement become a medication? Sometimes, it's hard to tell. Consider red yeast rice, the supplement Celeste Wright uses to lower her cholesterol. "It works," says Wright, a 66-year-old mother of two from Dripping Springs, Texas, who has been taking it since 2001. Wright had high cholesterol levels five years ago, when she began taking Pravachol, a popular prescription drug known as a statin that reduces cholesterol levels. Prone to allergies, she suffered a reaction to the drug that made her throat swell, her eyes burn and her skin break out in rashes.

WASHINGTON - Scientists have shown they can reduce cholesterol levels in mice by shutting off a disease-causing gene with a technique called RNA interference. The RNA approach has been the subject of great hope, and hype, since it was first discovered in studies of roundworms starting in 1998. It ultimately could lead to a drug-like treatment for hereditary disorders such as Huntington's disease by injecting tailored snippets of RNA, DNA'S molecular cousin, to silence a specific gene. The approach also has promise for treating a range of diseases, including heart disease and cancer, that have genetic factors, specialists said.

On the day after new recommendations on cholesterol levels made front-page news, a few fitness buffs were working out at the Downtown Athletic Club on their lunch hour. An informal sampling showed that they knew a lot about exercise and a healthy diet, but were a little shakier when it came to their blood-cholesterol levels. Harry Altscher, 57, a lawyer who lives in Ellicott City, stopped for a minute to towel off the sweat and admit that he didn't know what his LDL, or harmful cholesterol, is. This is the figure that some researchers now believe can't be too low for a healthy heart.