Reducing Cholesterol Lowers Risk of Heart Attack, Stroke, and Death, Study Finds (usatoday.com) 65
An anonymous reader shared this report from USA Today:
A new study reinforces the importance of lowering cholesterol in people at risk for, but who haven't had a heart attack or stroke. The study looked at a statin alternative, called bempedoic acid, and found that as it reduced levels of LDL cholesterol, it also lowered the risk for heart attack, stroke and death.
Researchers are quick to say bempedoic acid shouldn't be used instead of statins. It's far more expensive and doesn't have the decades-long track record of safety and effectiveness. But for people who can't tolerate statins or a high enough dose to bring their cholesterol levels down adequately, the new study suggests it's important to find alternatives, and that bempedoic acid can be at least part of the solution.
Researchers are quick to say bempedoic acid shouldn't be used instead of statins. It's far more expensive and doesn't have the decades-long track record of safety and effectiveness. But for people who can't tolerate statins or a high enough dose to bring their cholesterol levels down adequately, the new study suggests it's important to find alternatives, and that bempedoic acid can be at least part of the solution.
Wow. (Score:2)
Re:Wow. (Score:5, Insightful)
In other news, water is wet.
False. Water makes other things wet.
Oh my God... Who knew? (Score:2)
Re:The 80s phoned (Score:5, Insightful)
blood cholesterol levels have very little to do with dietary cholesterol. the issue is some people's livers generate more cholesterol than others, often due to genetics, often due to development of metabolic syndrom, etc
eating a healthy diet is a nice thought, but healthy diets dont really exist any more and if they did they'ed only be preventative
Re:The 80s phoned (Score:5, Informative)
Given you have a 6 digit ID, it's kinda funny that you haven't grown up over the last 20 years.
> Garbage. It has everything to do with it. Yes, some people are genetically prone to high levels but they're in the single digit percentages.
No, really, it's only very little. Cholesterol is really important to the body and lots of things can go wrong, either too much produced or not metabolised properly.
https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/n... [harvard.edu]
> Have you ever visited the salad idle in a supermarket? No, probably not. I doubt you've heard of the concept of exercise either.
Why do you think a salad is healthy?
What's more interesting is the study https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/... [nejm.org] was funded by Esperion Therapeutics who make the brand name of bempedoic acid called NEXLETOL.
From the study itself..
> The results for the other key secondary end points (fatal or nonfatal stroke, death from cardiovascular causes, and death from any cause) did not differ significantly between the bempedoic acid group and the placebo group
The USA Today article is full of spin. The study found that yes bempedoic acid will lower cholesterol in statin resistant patients, but it did NOT confirm that "Reducing Cholesterol Lowers Risk of Heart Attack, Stroke, and Death" in fact it confirmed the opposite, that the risk of heart attack, stroke, and death has no correlation with cholesterol levels as there was no difference between the placebo group or the bempedoic over that period.
Re: (Score:2)
" I hope you die. The sooner the better."
LOL :) Go stuff a burger in your face and feel better fat boy. Hopefully your heart will keep ticking long enough to think of another comedy riposte!
Re: (Score:2)
> Have you ever visited the salad idle in a supermarket? No, probably not. I doubt you've heard of the concept of exercise either.
> I'm sure you and all the other fat whales stuffing their fat faces with burgers would love to believe diet has no effect
> for your sack of lard physiques.
Do you think any of this language is productive? All you had to do was list studies that countered his claims, rather than assert with insults.
Re: (Score:2)
> I'm sure you and all the other fat whales stuffing their fat faces with burgers would love to believe diet has no effect but I'm afraid it does. Perhaps you believe exercise has no effect on fitness levels too, who knows.
> Salads - yes fresh veg is healthy tubby, try eating it sometime if you can waddle your wobbling backside to the isle without getting out of breath.
> Christ I'm so sick of people like you making any excuse except your own feckless and bone idle lifestyle for your sack of lard ph
Re: (Score:2)
"you don't know me son!"
Oh you paint a pretty clear picture my friend, sitting on your sofa stuffing your face blaming genetics on your stomach being the size of a small car.
Re: (Score:2)
> Oh you paint a pretty clear picture my friend, sitting on your sofa stuffing your face blaming genetics on your stomach being the size of a small car.
am.. am.. am I your first friend?!! How does it feel ðY£
Re: (Score:2)
Have you ever visited the salad idle in a supermarket? No, probably not. I doubt you've heard of the concept of exercise either.
I'm pretty sure you meant aisle instead of "idle". Of course, I've never seen a supermarket with a salad aisle. Salad bar, yes. Also a produce aisle or section. But not a specific salad aisle.
Re: (Score:2)
"I've never seen a supermarket with a salad aisle. Salad bar, yes. Also a produce aisle or section. But not a specific salad aisle."
Come to the UK. Every supermarket here has them. I guess int the US most of the beached whales wobbling about wouldn't even know what salad was.
Re: (Score:2)
Come to the UK. Every supermarket here has them. I guess int the US most of the beached whales wobbling about wouldn't even know what salad was.
I've been to the UK. Admittedly I didn't pay a lot of attention to supermarkets while I was there. I think we're having a silly semantic argument about what, exactly constitutes an "aisle" in a supermarket and whether the aisle has to be dedicated entirely to making salads to be called a salad aisle. Since the vegetables available in such an aisle are seldom there only to make salads then, to me, it doesn't make much sense to refer to as a salad aisle. Produce section, produce aisle, grocer's etc. but salad
Re: (Score:2)
"anyone who has had traditional English cooking, which is clearly intended as some kind of punishment for bad children."
Compared to what? French food is just overrated stews and eastern european cooking is merely subsistence food.
Re: (Score:2)
Doesn't need to be compared to anything. Just boil everything, including meats. I'm largely just being cheeky here, but I couldn't resist the dig at traditional English cooking, which I grew up with. It's obviously not actually all bad, there were just some things that were far less than appetizing.
Re: (Score:2)
> Come to the UK. Every supermarket here has them. I guess int the US most of the beached whales wobbling about wouldn't even know what salad was.
Now we definitely know you live on Deliveroo.. UK hasn't had any fresh vegetables since Brexit. When was the last time you saw the inside of a supermarket?
Re: (Score:2)
" UK hasn't had any fresh vegetables since Brexit"
Thanks for proving you're as clueless about economics and geography as you are about health. The majority of our farms are arable, not livestock, look on google earth halfwit.
Re: (Score:2)
> Thanks for proving you're as clueless about economics and geography as you are about health. The majority of our farms are arable, not livestock, look on google earth halfwit.
Ah, a Brexit voter. Explains things.
Re: The 80s phoned (Score:2)
Dude, I have been a competitive cyclist and swimmer for almost 30 of my 46 years and I have high cholesterol. I have been skinny af, I have spent time in the gym, I have spent time weighing my food and counting calories. I know that my heart rate still goes up into the 180s and I can do at least 1250w in a dead sprint.
I have had high cholesterol since I was in my 30s. My doctors finally put me on statins a couple years ago because they knew that managing it by diet was hopeless. I now have a perfectly norma
Re: (Score:2)
Which part of "some people are genetically prone to high levels" confused you?
Re: (Score:2)
Which part of "I'm not particularly unique" was confusing to YOU.
This is a relatively common problem; I have known several people over my life with high cholesterol, and they've been on absurdly restrictive diets and it was all for naught. You're vastly underestimating the number of people that just have high cholesterol despite eating great diets.
I remember telling a friend of mine about my high cholesterol, and he was floored, because he was a French dude that ate poutine and deep fried things and pure ga
Re: (Score:2)
eating a healthy diet is a nice thought, but healthy diets dont really exist any more and if they did they'ed only be preventative
I disagree. Healthy diets do exist, and it's not just a nice thought. It's a must.
You hear people crabbing that they don't know how or don't have time and I just don't want to hear it... man up and act like an adult. It's you're health FFS.
Re: (Score:3)
> I disagree. Healthy diets do exist, and it's not just a nice thought. It's a must.
> You hear people crabbing that they don't know how or don't have time and I just don't want to hear it... man up and act like an adult. It's you're health FFS.
It's not really about time, it's about modern farming methods and social norms.
If you go the vegetable route, vegetables (including organic) only have about 60% of the nutrition they had in the 1980s, due to over farming, shorter crop cycles/time in the ground,
Re: The 80s phoned (Score:3)
If you go the vegetable route, vegetables (including organic) only have about 60% of the nutrition they had in the 1980s
Can you give a citation for this? It is hard to imagine broccoli losing 40% of its fiber and vitamins and still looking exactly like broccoli from the 1980s (I was there).
Re: (Score:2)
Can you give a citation for this? It is hard to imagine broccoli losing 40% of its fiber and vitamins and still looking exactly like broccoli from the 1980s (I was there).
Here are two: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15637215/ [nih.gov] and https://www.nationalgeographic.co.uk/environment-and-conservation/2022/05/fruits-and-vegetables-are-less-nutritious-than-they-used-to-be [nationalgeographic.co.uk]. Or if you prefer a video, ahref=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yl_K2Ata6XYrel=url2html-8122 [slashdot.org]https://www.youtube.com/watch?... >
Re: (Score:1)
And the conclusions don't agree with "due to over farming, shorter crop cycles/time in the ground, etc etc. We need to be eating twice as much vegetables to get the same nutrients from them, if that's the choice of source."
We suggest that any real declines are generally most easily explained by changes in cultivated varieties between 1950 and 1999, in which there may be trade-offs between yield and nutrient content.
Re: (Score:3)
That first one, also cited in the second one, definitely doesn't show an across-the-board 40% decline in nutrition. They say if you look at 13 nutrients in 43 vegetables and take the ratio of 1999 values / 1950 values, you will see a statistically significant decline for 6 nutrients but not the other 7. For the nutrients that have declined, the median decline across vegetables ranges from 6% (protein) to 38% (riboflavin). If you look at the median changes across all 13 nutrients (center bars in Fig. 1), the
It's not about time it's about money (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
blood cholesterol levels have very little to do with dietary cholesterol.
That's only true for some people, and it's a red herring anyway. Even in people whose 'bad' serum cholesterol isn't meaningfully raised by consuming cholesterol, it IS raised by sugar and highly refined carbs.
The carbs that your body can't either use immediately or eliminate via the rectum, gets converted to fat. In the process, serum cholesterol - especially the 'bad' types - increases [healthline.com].
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
eating a healthy diet is a nice thought, but healthy diets dont really exist any more and if they did they'ed only be preventative
My apologies Sir, but your incorrect. A healthy diet can be achieved and is achieved by many people. The problem is that it takes a certain amount of effort and dedication since it is SO easy to be lazy and fall into the carb/sugar diet that a vast majority of people eat now.
I know of what I speak. I was part of that carb/sugar crowd. And then this nasty thing happened to me. I got older and fatter. And the blood tests started getting worse and were getting close to the danger zone. After researching it som
Re: (Score:1)
I still need to get off of drinking diet drinks with Aspartame, which has been shown to contribute to weight gain.
Actually, there is this one study to this effect, that everyone quotes, that shows aspartame has, gram for gram, same insulin effect as glucose. Done on rats, through IV infusion of said substances to eliminate the effect of sweet taste. Except... gram for gram. I mean really? Ever tried sweetening your tea with two teaspoons of aspartame and drinking that?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
eating a healthy diet is a nice thought, but I don't want to eat a healthy diet so I believe they dont really exist any more
Fixed that for you. There are plenty of perfectly healthy options. Just none then come as a microwavable 5 minute dinner for the slack and those who don't know how to cook.
Re: (Score:3)
> Fixed that for you. There are plenty of perfectly healthy options. Just none then come as a microwavable 5 minute dinner for the slack and those who don't know how to cook.
It's telling that a critique of the modern food industry results in personal attacks rather than conversation.
Re: The 80s phoned (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Hear, Hear!! Let everyone eat a healthy diet. Errrr....how do we guarantee people have enough money for a healthy diet?
Statins only control the amount of cholesterol you absorb through you gut. Your liver (as someone below noted) produces a lot of cholesterol.
Sugar (Score:2)
Stop eating sugar like a fiend and your triglycerides will to down so your small LDL will go down and your lumen health will improve. Add some K2MK7 and your hypertension may go down too.
The Number Needed to Treat on statins is huge and the risk number is lower.
Or eat ding-dongs and pop pills - you are what you eat.
Lower the risk of death? (Score:3)
I thought that was pretty much a given.
Chance of death reduced? (Score:1)
Not about eating cholesterol (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Yep. Inflammation + cholesterol is another story though.
Your liver (Score:4, Informative)
Since most cholesterol is made in the liver [healthline.com], I wonder why they don't study that more. Sure, you can lower cholesterol with a drug... which the liver has to process too, so how do we know that long term we aren't just creating a physical addiction to the cholesterol lowering drug, which will fail to treat the underlying liver problems and ultimately come back to bite us?
The statin class of drugs were originally isolated from Chinese herbal medicine (seriously, look it up) and herbalists didn't keep their patients on it long term AFAIK--they'd diagnose "cold" or a Chi imbalance or something, and mix it up in their tea for a while until they thought the patient was doing better.
That's not scientific of course, but a lot of things in medicine were and still are more of an art; but I digress.
Most cholesterol is made in the liver, and we should probably study liver health as much as diet, which may lead us back to things in the diet that are damaging the liver and I bet that's not eating fatty food. There's a growing pile of evidence it's the damned sugar, which was never in our diets to this degree until modern times; but alcohol and diseases, some of them STDs seem to be implicated in what I've linked above.
Disclaimer: Not a doctor. I just play one on the Internet.
PCSK9 inhibitors (Score:2)
I can't take statins - feel like I've been beaten with a baseball bat on 'em. Just no tolerating then for me.
Instead I've had good success with each of two PCSK9 inhibitors, both of which are biweekly self-injectables. No muss, no fuss, works great. Just expensive as fuck.
Looking forward to bempedoic acid becoming more affordable. Given the cost of either of my two monoclonal antibodies, it might already be cheaper.
Inflammatory diet (Score:3)
Blood serum cholesterol is produced by your body, not from the food you eat. High cholesterol is your body's response to inflammation. One of the biggest causes of inflammation is high insulin levels from a high carb and high processed food diet. For decades, people have been brainwashed by the junk food industry, into believing fat is bad for you, when it is the high carb junk that is destroying everyone's health.
Re: Inflammatory diet (Score:2)
Hallelujah!
25 years ago the WHO retracted " high cholesterol does not correlate with high dietary cholesterol".
But why am I surprised? People updating their beliefs and/or rationale throughout their lives? Hahahahaha. Scientists don't do that let alone the general public.
After all, people obviously do not understand second derivatives (I thought that speed and acceleration are understood by most). How else we'd have 85 percent of westerners saying there's a population explosion going on whereas the opposite
Call me a foil-hatted crackpot... (Score:2)
... but I know as a FACT that exercise has the same effect - PROVE ME WRONG!
Back To The Future (Score:2)
I guess studies like these are still necessary due to misinformation spread on the Internet.
Here is a clue for anyone who lost a lot of weight in the first 2 weeks of a wacky diet and then found "religion" about that way of eating:
Carbohydrates bound with water are stored in your muscles. It is called glycogen.
When
Re: (Score:2)
It's very much a choose-your-own-adventure. My biggest and most rapid fat loss was when I got into exercise gaming in VR, intense (>90% max heart rate) cardio many times a day, no dieting. I've also lost weight with dieting and no exercise. As long as you're in a calorie deficit anything works. "Why diet when you can burn off an entire big mac playing VR games for 35 minutes" vs "Why do cardio when you can just not eat", which one is easier depends on the circumstances.
I'm not a fan of impedance analys
Re: (Score:2)
Study funded by company that makes the drug (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
No mention anywhere that this study was funded by Esperion Therapeutics - the company that manufactures the drug. Hm? There's also studies that show people with higher LDL live longer than thoses with lower LDL.
[citation needed]
There's also studies that show heart disease is primarily driven by hyperinsulinemia.
[citation needed]
There's also a thing called an advanced lipid panel, which is far more informative than a simple blood test that shows you total LDL with a lipoprotein size breakdown. Just because you have normal range total LDL tells you nothing about the size breakdown or if athereosclerosis or LDL having a high residence rate.
For 99% of cases it correlates perfectly. Oh yes, of course, you're the special snowflake, and your doc is too stupid to see it.
The ignorance since the 1950s on heart disease and the war on fats just continues to full steam these days and shows in the posting of this story.
LDL and other ApoB carrying particles are *causally* related to heart disease, and there is no doubt about that. If your keto diet lowers your LDLc (heck, it does for me!) then, sure, go ahead, but if you're one of those people for whom keto makes LDLc skyrocket, then you need to stop following your damn religion, screaming "lean mass hyperresponde
Population not individuals (Score:2)
Um, Didn't We... (Score:1)
No shit (Score:2)
We already knew this. This has already been studied. We already knew reducing cholesterol counts reduced heart disease. It's not a surprise. Any other ways I can say it?
What we don't know is why, because reducing cholesterol intake does not have the same results. THAT would be news. This is not.
You can't lower the risk of death. (Score:2)