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Cholesterol Studies and Facts

By Experience Life Staff

June 2009

Studies on cholesterol that have called current assumptions into question.

A survey of 1,700 patients with hardening of the arteries, conducted by the famous heart surgeon Michael DeBakey, found no relationship between the level of cholesterol in the blood and the incidence of atherosclerosis.
DeBakey, M, et al, Journal of the American Medical Association, 1964, 189:655-59

A 2005 study explored the importance of inflammation and C-reactive protein in the cholesterol question.
“C-Reactive Protein Levels and Outcomes after Statin Therapy.”
New England Journal of Medicine, April 2005.
(http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/short/352/1/20)

A 2004 study exploring the role of inflammation and atherosclerosis.
“Inflammation and atherosclerosis: role of C-Reactive protein in risk assessment.”
The American Journal of Medicine, Volume 116, Issue 6, Pages 9-16, P.Libby, P.Ridker
(www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(04)00072-5/abstract)

One of the initial studies exploring diet and heart disease — a study often (incorrectly) cited as evidence of fat’s guilt in CHD. Researcher R. Masironi, however, found no parallel between the trends of fat consumption and coronary mortality.
“Dietary factors and coronary heart disease.”
Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 1970.
(www.researchgate.net/publication/
18919035_Dietetic_factors_and_coronary_heart_diseases)

A comparative study of the effect of cholesterol in other mammals, namely rabbits. The study has been criticized as inaccurate because it is based on force-feeding animals food that they would never eat voluntarily and cannot digest or metabolize in order to raise blood cholesterol. Most of these animal studies have served to underscore the shaky tie between a high-fat diet and cholesterol, according to Uffe Ravnskov, MD, PhD.
“The contribution of comparative atherosclerosis to the understanding of human atherosclerosis.”
J Atheroscler Res. 1968 May-Jun;8(3):377-80.

Ravnskov explores the weak scientific evidence that has been used to propagate the lipid hypothesis.
“The fallacies of the lipid hypothesis.”
The Scandinavian Cardiovascular Journal, 2008.
(www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18615352)

Ravnskov examines the strong evidence that statins do more than just lower cholesterol, and as a result, lowered cholesterol cannot be credited with the health improvements seen in certain statin studies.
“Implications of 4S Evidence on Baseline Lipid Levels.”
The Lancet, 1995.

A widely publicized study in the New England Journal of Medicine concluded that all people who have had a stroke should be on Lipitor. Every one of the authors, however, was either a Pfizer employee or consultant. What’s more, the study found that the chance of hemorrhagic stroke increased 67 percent in people using Lipitor versus using nothing. (Stroke prevention by aggressive reduction in cholesterol levels investigators.
“High-dose atorvastatin after stroke or transient ischemic hepatic.”
New England Journal of Medicine, 2006;355:549-559)

The danger of too-low cholesterol

Because cholesterol is essential to so many functions, inadequate cholesterol levels may lead to a number of health problems, including depression. An eight-year Finnish study of men between the ages of 50 and 69, published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, found that those reporting depression had significantly lower blood-cholesterol levels than those who were not.
(Abstract: http://bjp.rcpsych.org/cgi/content/abstract/175/3/259?ijkey=52367ceb5658616833fe253f4dd72fee4e884a20&keytype2
=tf_ipsecsha )

In the famous Framingham study, which is considered the cornerstone of the cholesterol-CHD connection, researchers pointed to a "correlation coefficient" between high cholesterol and coronary heart disease, which was only 0.36 — about half of that between smoking and lung cancer. But this correlation reveals nothing about causation, and Ravnskov points out that, according to the Framingham study, “for men above age 47, cholesterol levels made no difference” in mortality rates. This research further points to the lack of connection between LDL-cholesterol levels and risk of heart attack. Additionally, in the Framingham study, although individuals with high cholesterol were more likely to die from CHD, their overall mortality rate was actually lower than that of individuals with lower cholesterol.
(www.framinghamheartstudy.org/)

A 2004 University of Hawaii study published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, found that men over age 70 were much more likely to develop heart disease if their total cholesterol level was below 200 than if it was between 200 and 219.
(Abstract: www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/118743805
/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0 )

In a 1986 study from the Journal of Chronic Disease, cancer incidence in the first two years after the cholesterol measurement was consistently higher among persons whose cholesterol levels were in the lowest quintile. This was one of the first studies that looked at cancer risks tied to cholesterol levels.
(www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3793838)

Exploring the link between too-low cholesterol and increase risk of suicide, from the Lancet.
(www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1347593)

Low total cholesterol is associated with high total mortality in patients with coronary heart disease from the European Heart Journal.(http://eurheartj.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract
/18/1/52)

Sources