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Low carb diets for healthier arteries?
A doctor speaks out about heart health and cholesterol, and the link between inflammation and heart disease.
More on the role of low carb diets
We recommend Dr. Lundell's book, it's thought provoking... and well worth adding to your library.
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Can low carb diets help keep your arteries and cardiovascular system healthy? We thought you would be interested in what one physician, Dr. Dwight Lundell, has to say on the subject.| "Our training, knowledge and authority often acquire a rather large ego that tends to make it difficult to admit we are wrong. So, here it is. I freely admit to being wrong. As a heart surgeon with 25 years experience, having performed over 5,000 open-heart surgeries, today is my day to right the wrong with medical and scientific fact." |
Dr. Lundell says that based on education and association with the medical establishment, he and other doctors have believed for years that heart disease was simply the result of elevated blood cholesterol. As such, doctors prescribed medications to lower cholesterol and counseled patients to adopt a diet that severely restricted fat intake. Deviations from these recommendations were considered heresy! Guess What? This approach is not working!Could it be that inflammation in the arteries is the real culprit? Dr. Lundell continues, | "Despite the fact that 25% of the population takes expensive statin medications and despite the fact we have reduced the fat content of our diets, more Americans will die this year of heart disease than ever before. Statistics from the American Heart Association show that 75 million Americans currently suffer from heart disease, 20 million have diabetes and 57 million have pre-diabetes. These disorders are affecting younger and younger people in greater numbers every year. Simply stated, without inflammation being present in the body, there is no way that cholesterol would accumulate in the wall of the blood vessel and cause heart disease and strokes. Without inflammation, cholesterol would move freely throughout the body as nature intended. It is inflammation that causes cholesterol to become trapped. Inflammation is not complicated — it is quite simply your body’s natural defense to a foreign invader such as a bacteria, toxin or virus. The cycle of inflammation is perfect in how it protects your body from these bacterial and viral invaders. However, if we chronically expose the body to injury by toxins or foods the human body was never designed to process, a condition occurs called chronic inflammation. Chronic inflammation is just as harmful as acute inflammation is beneficial." |
What causes inflammation? According to Dr. Lundell, the injury and inflammation in our arteries is caused by the low fat diet that has been recommended for years by mainstream medicine. Chronic inflammation in the arteries leads to heart disease, stroke, diabetes and obesity.He identifies the major cause of chronic inflammation as the overload of simple, highly processed carbohydrates (sugar, flour, and all the products made from them) and the excess consumption of omega-6 vegetable oils like soybean, corn, and sunflower that are found in many processed foods. Low carb diets just may be part of the solution. What is your experience with low carb diets and the medical establishment? Send us your story.
See also Carbohydrates, Low Carb Diet, Dietary Fat: Good or Evil?, Heart Healthy Eating, and Was Atkins Right?.
Dr. Dwight Lundell is the past Chief of Staff and Chief of Surgery at Banner Heart Hospital, Mesa, AZ. His private practice, Cardiac Care Center was in Mesa, AZ. Recently Dr. Lundell left surgery to focus on the nutritional treatment of heart disease. He is the founder of Healthy Humans Foundation that promotes human health with a focus on helping large corporations promote wellness. He is the author of The Cure for Heart Disease: Truth Will Save a Nation and The Great Cholesterol Lie. Dr. Lundell's full article appears on Early to Rise’s Total Health Breakthroughs, a website that offers alternative health solutions for mind, body and soul.
Return from Low Carb Diets to Lipid Hypothesis
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