The Heart Attack Grill

Having been away from the blog for a couple of weeks to prepare for a medical meeting, I was intrigued to find this as the top post.

One of the funniest little segments on nutrition and health I’ve ever seen. The restaurant owner is one very savvy and imaginative capitalist.

P.S. I know that most of you guys read a lot of Newsmax. Newsmax has a health session, who’s mission seems to be dedicated to the mission of disproving that fatty foods cause heart disease and cholesterol is related to heart disease, e.g.

http://www.newsmax.com/health/cholesterol_cardiac_risk/2009/01/13/170744.html

Cholesterol Levels Don’t Indicate Cardiac Risk

Now, this is typical Newsmax. Reminds me of the sort of sensationalistic certitude that they also bring to the campaign to attempt to debunk the potential dangers of soaring levels of atmospheric CO2.

But look at the difference between what the Newsmax-written headline says and what the study really shows:

Tuesday, January 13, 2009 8:51 AM

A new national study has shown that nearly 75 percent of patients hospitalized for a heart attack had cholesterol levels that would indicate they were not at high risk for a cardiovascular event, according to current national cholesterol guidelines.

Specifically, these patients had low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol levels that met current guidelines, and close to half had LDL levels classified in guidelines as optimal (less than 100 mg/dL).

“Almost 75 percent of heart attack patients fell within recommended targets for LDL cholesterol, demonstrating that the current guidelines may not be low enough to cut heart attack risk in most who could benefit,” said Dr. Gregg C. Fonarow, Eliot Corday Professor of Cardiovascular Medicine and Science at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and the study’s principal investigator.

The headline implies that cholesterol levels are not related to heart attack risk. This headline is completey wrong. Cholesterol levels are strongly and without question related to heart attack risk. What the study shows is that levels of serum cholesterol previously viewed as being “safe,” are, in fact not safe at all, and that cholesterol guidelines need to be lowered, if people are to really have cholesterols in the “safe” range.

But what a great video and what a great idea. I do think that people have every right to kill themselves, if they want to do this, as long as they pay for their own health insurance and don’t endanger others in the process.

– Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA (who, for health reasons, hasn’t knowingly eaten red meat since 1970).

Looks like someone has had a humour bypass;)

Ouch! I’d make some smart ass joke about Nurse Ratched but Ifidel Granny R.N. might take it the wrong way.

First job I ever had was working in a hospital and most of the nurses there had a pretty active sense of humor. They needed it to deal with death and disease on a daily basis.

It’s not like Scott posted photos of naughty nurses or anything!

Now Scott… don’t you post anything like that!

I have a really good come back to Scott but am now feeling the effects of Infidel Granny and will hold my tongue…

Something about stacks of meat….

What of the “good” cholesterol vs “bad” cholesterol. In other words, is *all* cholsterol bad? And is there a realistic balance of moderation on the fats vs constant eating of “card board”. Just a generic question.

“Bad” cholesterol is low density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol. It is present in fatty animal meats and synthesized in the liver from saturated (e.g. butter/cheese) and trans fats.

Good cholesterol is high density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol. You can think of LDL as garbage and HDL as the garbage truck, which carries out the garbage for disposal. The less LDL the better. The more HDL the better. Only, in people on very, very low fat diets, there is very little LDL and, accordingly, no need for garbage trucks; so HDL goes down. This is not a problem in such people. You can lower LDL with very low fat diets and you can also lower it with very low carb diets. The major problem with very low carb diets (which tend to be high fat) is that we don’t know the long term effect of these diets on other diseases, such as cancer.

You can raise HDL (get more garbage trucks to haul out your garbage) by moderate drinking (1 to 3 drinks per day) or by vigorous exercise and/or by eating what are called “healthy” fats, e.g. olive oil, almonds, walnuts.

In terms of fats, what are bad are: (1) land animal fats (cholesterol and saturated fat), (2) hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated (trans) fats (READ LABELS), (3) tropical oils (palm and coconut oil — beware theater popcorn). What are “good” are fish oils (omega 3), monounsaturated fats (olive oil, canola oil), most nuts (omega 3). What are more or less neutral (but which may promote cancer) are the omega 6 unsaturated fats, e.g. soybean oil, corn oil.

I think that ultra-low fat, low glycemic (high glycemic being non-lactose sugars and “white” starches) diets, combined with exercise, have a lot to commend them, but very few people can successfully follow these diets (and get regular exercise); so a good alternative are low salt versions of so-called “Mediterranean” diets.

There, as good as a 300 page, 30 dollar diet book. Such a deal.

– Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA