Reduce Your Risk of Heart Disease
The B Vitamin Connection
If you are at risk for or have even been diagnosed with heart disease, you’re
probably very concerned about your cholesterol level. You can hardly turn on your
radio, pick up a magazine, or watch your television set without being bombarded,
not only by information about cholesterol and heart disease, but also by hundreds
of ads for prescription medications promising to lower your cholesterol.
But, cholesterol may have less to do with heart disease than you think.
Consider this: if heart attacks are caused by high fat, high cholesterol diets,
why do many heart attack victims have normal cholesterol levels?
Also, French cuisine is notoriously rich in fat and cholesterol, but the French
have less than half the heart attacks that occur per capita in North America.
How can we explain that?
Highly regarded physician and scientist, Dr. Kilmer McCully asked himself the same
thing.
Realizing that the cholesterol theory of heart disease had never been proven—even
after 85 years of research—Dr. McCully began to look for a different explanation.
Beginning in 1968 and continuing throughout his practice and professorship at Harvard
and Massachusetts General Hospital, Dr. McCully developed a new scientific explanation
for the cause of clogged arteries. His theory was revolutionary because it presented
elevated homocysteine concentrations in the blood as the unrecognized cause
of heart disease and arteriosclerosis.
What is homocysteine?
Homocysteine is an amino acid that occurs naturally in your body as it processes
protein. According to Dr. McCully:
“When there is too much homocysteine in the blood,
arteries are damaged and plaques form. The result is arteriosclerosis and heart
disease. This happens when we don’t get enough of certain vitamins—namely
B-6, B-12, and folic acid. These B vitamins are missing in our diets because
processing and refining foods (think white flour, sugar, and canning) destroys these
sensitive vitamins.”
The Heart Revolution
by Kilmer S. McCully, M.D,
For many years, clogged arteries were thought to be the cause of heart disease,
but the clogging itself only comes about as a result of the damage caused by homocysteine.
The theory has been assessed in several scientific studies.
The Physicians’ Health Study showed that, “Men with
plasma homocysteine concentrations that were 12 percent above the upper limit of
normal had approximately a threefold increase in the risk of myocardial infarction,
as compared with those with lower levels, even after correction for other risk factors.”
From Homocysteine and Atherothrombosis -
By George N. Welch, M.D., and Joseph
Loscalzo, M.D., Ph.D., The New England Journal of Medicine, Vol. 338, No.15
It is now widely acknowledged by scientists that pure cholesterol does not cause
arteriosclerosis and that elevation of blood cholesterol is a symptom, not a cause
of heart disease.
Your diet is a critical part of the equation.
You may be asking yourself: if cholesterol is a symptom, rather than a cause of
heart disease, why aren’t the French in the same boat?
The answer lies in our Western diet and poor lifestyle habits. Think about all the
fast food restaurants, convenience stores filled with junk food, or even the over-processed
foods that sit on the shelves of every grocery store—this food has little
or no nutritional value. Yet, it has become a part of the lifestyle in North America,
whereas in France, fast and over-processed food is only beginning to make its way
into their cuisine.
Our fast food mindset—combined with the depletion of vital minerals in our
soils—has led to multiple deficiencies of essential nutrients. And due to
our poor health choices, North Americans are generally depleted of the essential
B vitamins.
And without the B vitamins, homocysteine becomes toxic and damages your artery
walls, practically inviting fats and cholesterol to stick around.
Other factors, of course, can increase homocysteine in your blood, including your
genetic background, certain drugs, aging, hormonal changes such as menopause, smoking,
how little you exercise, diabetes, and high blood pressure.
You can’t control all these things, but you can do something about your diet.
The American Heart Association strongly advises patients at high risk for heart
disease “to be sure to get enough folic acid and vitamins B-6 and B-12 in
their diet. They should eat at least five servings of fruits and green, leafy vegetables
daily."
Don’t ignore your cholesterol
Even though cholesterol buildup is a symptom and not a cause of heart disease, it’s
still important for you to monitor your cholesterol intake.
Doctors and nutritionists consistently recommend that you decrease your level of
low-density lipoprotein (LDL), the so-called “bad” cholesterol, and
increase your high-density lipoprotein (HDL), the so-called “good” cholesterol
in the blood.
And they are right! LDL is indeed bad for you…because it is the vehicle for
homocysteine. A high level of LDL is correctly associated with a higher risk of heart
disease because it delivers the damaging homocysteine to the artery walls.
The less LDL you have in your system, the less homocysteine reaches your artery
walls.
Doctors and scientists have applied all their knowledge, talent, and resources into
fighting heart disease—they’ve developed dietary guidelines, exercise
regimes, and even cholesterol reducing drugs.
Yet heart disease remains the number one killer in this country!
The question you have to ask yourself is why, with all the extensive and exhaustive
research being applied to fight heart disease, are we not winning the war against
it?
Perhaps it’s because we’ve been looking in the wrong place and fighting
the wrong battle.
Cut your risk of heart disease by controlling the real culprit, homocysteine.
Eat five servings of fresh fruits and vegetables a day, and augment your diet with
a high-quality supplement like TriVita’s Sublingual B-12, B-6 & Folic
Acid. Providing over 100% of the recommended daily intake for B-12, B-6 and folic
acid TriVita’s Sublingual B-12, B-6 & Folic Acid can help you win the
war against heart disease.
