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How do we stop heart disease (Atherosclerosis, Arteriolosclerosis, Arteriosclerosis, calcification)

prioris

Senior Member
Messages
622
My reading recommendation is www.drmalcolmkendrick.org

If you twist your ankle, and tear ligaments, you will also find a great deal of inflammation in the surrounding area. You would, however, be stretching reality to suggest inflammation is the underlying cause of ankle ligament damage. I suppose you could try.

In my simple little world, inflammation is a result of underlying damage. It is not, and cannot be the underlying cause. Inflammation is a manifestation of the body attempting to heal itself. In fact, whenever I see the word inflammation, I mentally replace it with the word ‘healing.’


He made point that inflammation is not the cause itself which I agree.

He talks about not stopping the inflammation process with anything. I agree about cortisones. Until we know underlying cause to cut off inflammation, the only thing on a practical level is to inhibit inflammation process. remember, it isn't like there is some natural process underway that is going to resolve it on it's own because root cause still doing damage.. You could do it that way if you addressed the ROOT CAUSE of the inflammation. So his advice seems logical on one level but impractical at another. Cortisone itself has side effects so not a good choice in stopping inflammation long term. you trade one problem for another. You apply more natural medicine.
 

prioris

Senior Member
Messages
622
@prioris ~ That is good that you are paying attention to what you eat. I am definitely doing the same!

I don't have any cardiologist. I am a DIY person. I don't care about credentials. If their too integrated into the current health care system, I consider them dangerous to my health especially for chronic health problems. I see enough red flags about him to say he is not for me.

That link implicating choline in TMAO health problems is a red flag. Nutrients are almost never the problem especially when we're talking about average use. It is usually something else so that could make the TMAO suspect too.

I always wanted to be a vegetarian but for many reasons it was not practical in my particular situation. Outside of general items like saturated fats etc, i don't talk about diets since they are a large subjects onto themselves. Hopefully your diet works out for you.

For heart burn, may I suggest D-Limonene.
 
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Timaca

Senior Member
Messages
792
Hi prioris~
I tried D-Limonene in the past. It did not work for me. Thanks for the suggestion though!!

Best,
 

Gondwanaland

Senior Member
Messages
5,092
Therefore I post again the link to the story of one very seriously affected who, by doing all the detective work, was able to beat the beast and reversed his CAC score. For helping you guys start thinking out of the box and find your true contributors by analogy:

http://www.k-vitamins.com/index.php?page=My_Story
I propose we comment/discuss his assertions. I have a few thing I would like to point out about his conclusions. @prioris would you like a new thread to be created for that?
 

prioris

Senior Member
Messages
622
I propose we comment/discuss his assertions. I have a few thing I would like to point out about his conclusions. @prioris would you like a new thread to be created for that?

I would think it is fine here. This thread is about bringing together a lot of scattered information and links on ways of healing of and preventing the progression of heart disease. The CAC score seems very significant to me also.

As far as truly off topic subjects, i'm practical about it. No thread can be really pure. The key with off topic stuff is keep it short like around a paragraph or less. I think people can skip over those without any problems. it can be more sometimes. An occasional off topic post is not big deal either.

If someone is truly interested in this subject, they will read the entire thread even with clutter in it.
 

Gondwanaland

Senior Member
Messages
5,092
I would think it is fine here.
I will start then. His 1st list goes 1st:
i.) CAD is stimulated by the wrong oils. So, Olive, Fish, Almond, Butter, & MacNut are good for you. The rest will “kill”. This has to do with the APO B-100 formation - - - too much bad oil and one gets small dense LDLs (I call them golf balls) while what you want is beach balls (large and fluffy). Note: the only cholesterol test worth anything is one's particle size and number.
I think this idea is a bit limiting. I found great help from toasted sesame oil (combined with other helping measures) for high uric acid/gout flare. Additionally, Tocotrienols come from other oil types (needless tosay they should be cold pressed).
k.) Thyroid matters. Could talk about this for days, but suffice to say keep your Free T3 as high as possible and drive your TSH to as low as possible. Remember the USA TSH standards are way higher than Europe.
I am not sure about this. Obviously a healthy thyroid is a must, but wouldn't pushing the metabolism accelerate aging?
p.) Fish oil matters, but only works if taken with milk (not kidding = = = research from Hungary) - - - taking fish oil typically drops your Tri-G by about 50% if taken with milk or a meal with fat in it. If you take fish oil without milk or fat, it is not effective. That was a fun experiment. I did it over a week and to this day, I can "bounce" my TGs by just not taking my Fish Oil with a dietary fat.
High quality milk is off-limits for me due to too much xanthine oxidase + vit A, and low quality milk is off-limits for me due to degraded B2.
What really lowers Trig is reducing carb intake. I fired the endo who kept insisting I should not eat saturated fat due to my high trig - I didn't eat any sat fat back then, and when I told him my fatty liver was gone after going GF, he was mad at the nutritionist who suggested me to drop gluten. I never went back.
s.) Infants have CAD until about when their hormonal systems kick in. (I call that a real my my my).
Indeed my my my moment :jaw-drop:
t.) Arteries are “insulted” by viruses, bacteria, chemicals, and just plain mechanics of motion. If it moves it breaks - - - so the body repair crew needs to be on their game. It is this same crew that in turn - - - turns on you. So, keep the repair crew happy and "kill the invaders".
That is something I have always asked myself: one takes K2 to avoid artery calcification, but calcification is needed to repair damage. We need to prevent what is causing damage. I could never keep my homocysteina as low as I wish with just diet. Things that I have observed as a fact (blood test) to lower my Hcy were coconut oil and MB12. However, coconut oil causes a great extinction amon my lymphocytes (sulfite toxicity), and I don't get pleasant effects from taking MB12 on its own anymore. Dr. Kendrik writes brilliantly about what causes heart disease.
y.) Keep your vitamin C, Lysine, and Arginine high (Arginine is a pituitary stimulator which is a good thing).
Even dr Kendrick advocates for the vit C, but I recently read it causes the body to flush B6 out. This rings a bell for me personally since I feel awful from supplemental vit C, and this week I watched someone taking vit C and having to go to the ER with muscle cramps the following day (obviously this person has a severe case of B6 deficiency - allergies etc - but no dr diagnosed it and I can't say anything).
2005 to 2010

a.) The vaccinations had caused damage.
Yes, I am pretty convinced the yellow fever vaccine I took back in 2010 messed up my immune system, but the 1st sign I got about something going really wrong was the endothelial rupture followed by clotting.

More later.
 

pamojja

Senior Member
Messages
2,384
Location
Austria
I will start then. His 1st list goes 1st:
i.) CAD is stimulated by the wrong oils. So, Olive, Fish, Almond, Butter, & MacNut are good for you. The rest will “kill”.

I think this idea is a bit limiting. I found great help from toasted sesame oil (combined with other helping measures) for high uric acid/gout flare. Additionally, Tocotrienols come from other oil types (needless tosay they should be cold pressed).

That's why I suggested to take ptheut's (his name on the TYP forum, where he still is very active and helpful) example as an analogy, not to be followed without further self-education. An analogy to self-educate and apply the learned to your situation in the known of all risks. As he said on his site:
So, now began my journey into the world of cardiology. ..Without exaggeration, from November 13, 2002, to date, I have spent on the average 4 hours per night reading peer-reviewed literature associated with cardiology and the associated tentacles of thinking. So, without any hesitation, I can safely say I have well over 11,000 hours of data mining.

With that amount of diving into highly specific research, most MDs would never find the time to delve into (beside mostly being not interested into any research beyond what they are allowed to prescribe within standard of care), he came across many applications which have been in use before pharmaceuticals became widely available. And for me, only investigating since 2009, am still far behind his knowledge. Many of his conclusions still carry question marks and probably can't answer much.

One stark example was his past 16 mg of daily vanadium use against diabetes, about which he answered long ago on TYP:
Vanadium was given to diabetics prior to 1930. it works through a "backdoor system" - - - i got on it due to a major adrenal system insult due to the MMR vaccination ( am not kidding in the least on this point) - - - my insulin went from 2 to 5 to 40+
worked my butt off to let my pancreas go to sleep and repair itself. my insulin is now consistently less than 5. will be slowing weaning myself off it. now, as for the genetic damage, well, most likely a good point, but, what choice did i have? metformin, et.al was not about to pull this down and i was already on a sugar restriced diet. OBTW my CAC went up by 600pts in 6 months when this occured.

Simple don't go there without double-checking the literature he got that from, and being 100% certain it applies to you, and if you're willing to take its risks!

An other example is his being fond of 66ml ethanol for raising HDL. Where he counters the depletion of the B with the highest B intake I've seen anyone taking:
B1 - - - 500mg - one in am - - NSI
B2 - - - 400mg - one in am - - Bio Tech Pharmacal
Niacin - - - 500mg/pill - 2 in am - 2 in pm - - - 2000mg total - Endurance Products Co.
Biotin - - - 5mg - one in am - Country Life Brand
Paba - - - 1000mg - one in am - Country Life Brand
Choline - - - 500mg - one in am - as Bitartrate - Natures Way
TMG - - - 1000mg/pill - 2 in am - NOW Brand
Inositol - - - 510mg as Hexaphosphate - one in am - Puritan's Pride
Pantethine - - - 300mg per pill - 5 in am and 5 in pm - - - Puritan's Pride
B-12 - - - 5mg per pill - sublingual - - 5 in am and 5 in pm - - - total of 10 pills
Folic Acid - - - 20mg/pill - 2 in am - Bio Tech Pharmacal
B-6 - - - 500mg - one in am - Source Naturals

Which he explained:
the 6/12/folic acid is in a ratio that allows one to use etoh without liver issues and the Bs in general hammer the homocystiene

Don't imitate him in his intake, but his determination to learn and apply!

Therefore with specific cold pressed oils, like sesame or black seed, once informed of their particular health benefit, and not loosing sight of the overall omega 6:3 ratio, I personally see no reason not to use discriminatingly.

Also disagreed a couple of times with his stance of vitamin A:

l.) The liver looks at the vitamin K and D levels and adjusts the amount of vitamin A in proportion to your body - - -so eat your carrots - - - beta carotene is far safer than taking vitamin A.

Since up to 50% of the population cant convert beta carotene to Vitamin A in the body (similar as with folic acid) I went sure by testing my serum retinol. Even with higher intake my serum levels were just at lower end of normal. And since recently supplementing more than 24.000 IU Vitamin A I got rid of frequent psoriasis out-breaks, ...and we continue to disagree.

Nevertheless, he's a really authentic, friendly and helpful guy. :) And I'm sure if one question bothers you too much you could always contact him through his site, and have a nice surprise.
 

pamojja

Senior Member
Messages
2,384
Location
Austria
k.) Thyroid matters. Could talk about this for days, but suffice to say keep your Free T3 as high as possible and drive your TSH to as low as possible. Remember the USA TSH standards are way higher than Europe.
I am not sure about this. Obviously a healthy thyroid is a must, but wouldn't pushing the metabolism accelerate aging?

That's the general approach at TrackYourPlaque. From it's 2nd edition:

Chapter 11

Is your thyroid to blame?

When it comes to seizing control over coronary plaque, conventional
notions of thyroid health may need to be thrown out the window.
Marginal thyroid dysfunction is common and can be an important
contributor to distortions of LDL cholesterol, Lp(a), and body weight.
Correction of even subtle degrees of thyroid dysfunction is important
to gain full control over coronary plaque growth. It also can make you
feel happier, more energetic, and thinner.

The thyroid gland modulates metabolism, fine-tuning the function of
virtually every tissue, from lowly cells at the base of the fingers
making fingernails, to the neurons in your brain guiding memory and
thought, to the cells lining your arteries.Hypothyroidism, or deficiency
of active thyroid hormones, can wreak devastating effects on health.
It’s been known for decades that, when severe, signs of
hypothyroidism are obvious and advanced degrees
of atherosclerosis and heart failure develop. However, more recently,
it has come to be recognized that even mild degrees of
hypothyroidism can also contribute to heart disease. Mild
hypothyroidism is also proving to be far more common than
previously suspected. Because it is less dramatic, it can go
undetected longer, doing damage slowly over many years, including
allowing growth of coronary plaque. Subtle degrees of hypothyroidism
can also be trickier to diagnose. Add to this the debate among the
medical community over the boundary between “normal” and
abnormally “low” thyroid function, not to mention the widespread
tendency to treat only laboratory values while ignoring the patient.

It is Track Your Plaque’s mission to help identify every possible
advantage for stopping or reversing plaque growth. To that end,
normal─no, perfect─thyroid function may be key.

Hormone normalization plays a key at TYP. If you're about to die from CVD aging becomes a lesser concern.
 

pamojja

Senior Member
Messages
2,384
Location
Austria
p.) Fish oil matters, but only works if taken with milk (not kidding = = = research from Hungary) - - - taking fish oil typically drops your Tri-G by about 50% if taken with milk or a meal with fat in it. If you take fish oil without milk or fat, it is not effective. That was a fun experiment. I did it over a week and to this day, I can "bounce" my TGs by just not taking my Fish Oil with a dietary fat.
High quality milk is off-limits for me due to too much xanthine oxidase + vit A, and low quality milk is off-limits for me due to degraded B2.
What really lowers Trig is reducing carb intake. I fired the endo who kept insisting I should not eat saturated fat due to my high trig - I didn't eat any sat fat back then, and when I told him my fatty liver was gone after going GF, he was mad at the nutritionist who suggested me to drop gluten. I never went back.

Asked him if coconut or MCT oil would also do. His reply was, any of the healthy oils.

That is something I have always asked myself: one takes K2 to avoid artery calcification, but calcification is needed to repair damage. We need to prevent what is causing damage. I could never keep my homocysteina as low as I wish with just diet. Things that I have observed as a fact (blood test) to lower my Hcy were coconut oil and MB12. However, coconut oil causes a great extinction amon my lymphocytes (sulfite toxicity), and I don't get pleasant effects from taking MB12 on its own anymore.

In fact, that has been the experience with repeated CAC scoring at TYP. Usually the first year CAC score increases, before the increase decelerates through all the measures taken.

More later.

You're welcome.
 
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prioris

Senior Member
Messages
622
Conventional diabetes treatment with insulin has a long history of causing cardiovascular problems . It makes sugar numbers look better so doctor and patient thinks it is working but it isn't curing anything. A different approach may be better. I wish I knew about this years before someone I knew who had diabetes and eventually succumbed to cardiovascular problems. Wasn't till I got liver disease that I could put enough of the pieces together Oh well!

Dr. John McDougall shares how he treats and helps his patients revert diabetes with diet.

How to Prevent and Treat Diabetes, Part 2, Webinar: 11/19/15

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In a nutshell, his therapeutic approach that has been successful in curing type 2 diabetes is essentially ...

High carbohydrate diet,
Important to remove saturated fats because this will cause people to become diabetic
Use other oils but not too much
Eat lean protein but not too much because too much protein will cause blood sugar to rise.

In vast majority of people, he takes them off insulin the first day except for the few whose pancreas may not be producing enough insulin If this is not done, the insulin will cause hypoglycemia.
 
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Gondwanaland

Senior Member
Messages
5,092
You're welcome.
Thanks
In fact, that has been the experience with repeated CAC scoring at TYP. Usually the first year CAC score increases, before the increase decelerates through all the measures taken.
TYP?
High carbohydrate diet,
Important to remove saturated fats because this will cause people to become diabetic
Yes, the trouble begins when mixing hi carb + hi fat (as in milk?)
too much protein will cause blood sugar to rise.
I thought hi prot would make insulin rise but not blood sugar.
 

prioris

Senior Member
Messages
622
in regard to protein, go to 12 minute mark on video. he says "blood sugar" in regard to graph
 

pamojja

Senior Member
Messages
2,384
Location
Austria
Interesting that there is an initial increase...

Or rather, it's a disease-process with its own momentum. In Dr. Davis own words (from his 2nd edition again):

Chapter 6

Can I reduce my heart scan score?

If we can accurately measure coronary plaque, we should aim to
reduce it.


Like a weed in your garden, coronary plaque can grow rapidly.
With growth unchecked, plaque scores increase, on average, at a
rate of 30–35% per year (Janowitz 1991; Maher 1999; Budoff 2000;
Raggi 2005). A starting score of 100 will become 130, 169, 220, 286,
371, . . . kaboom!!!

Heart attack doesn’t necessarily occur once a specific value
heart scan value is exceeded, but the likelihood of heart attack
escalates along with the score. It’s like building a house of cards: the
more cards you stack, the shakier the structure, until you add that
final card and it all collapses. Growing plaque is unstable plaque.

If you know your heart scan score, your future is at a
crossroads. One path leads to life with a score that doesn’t increase
(or decreases) versus another path with your score increasing the
expected 30-35% per year. How different is your future between the
two paths? Even in the ensuing two years, an increasing score
means your heart attack risk skyrockets 20-fold. It means you’re
getting closer and closer to that day when catastrophe strikes. In
contrast, a stable or decreasing score means high likelihood of
remaining free of heart attack and major heart procedures. There is
tremendous benefit to stopping your score.

Can you reduce your score? Most people can, given the proper
tools, adherence to the program, and sufficient time.

What does it mean to reduce your score?
When a heart scan score is held stable or is reduced, this is
evidence that, not only is plaque no longer growing, it is being
inactivated. (Plaque activity cannot be directly measured in a live
human, so we need to rely on indirect methods.) You have
eabsorbed fatty tissue in the plaque, shrunk plaque size, turned off
nflammatory processes and enzymes, and extracted some of the
calcium. When plaque is inactivated, it is far less likely to rupture and
cause heart attack.

You and I can live happily with plaque. We just don’t want
plaque that is growing and potentially rupture-prone. A stable or
educed heart scan score can be viewed as indirect evidence of
plaque inactivation. Inactive plaque is far less likely to rupture, to
cause heart attack and other catastrophes.

How do I know if my score has increased or decreased?

How do you know what plaque is doing—shrinking or growing?
Simple: get another scan.

Many people ask: Doesn’t having a “perfect” cholesterol value
with treatment guarantee a reduction in score? Unfortunately, it does
not. How about a perfect lifestyle—strict adherence to diet, vigorous
exercise, adequate sleep, etc? This won’t guarantee that plaque
shrinks, either. Cholesterol values, even lipoproteins (discussed in
chapter 7) are only starting points to identify potential tools to shrink
your plaque. The only way to measure results in a specific individual
s to re-measure the quantity of plaque present: get another scan.
Reducing cholesterol, eating healthy, etc. are indeed helpful and
enhance the likelihood of stopping your score, but no specific
measure guarantees it.

In fact, there is nothing that truly tells you what your score is
doing except . . . another score. Tracking your plaque is therefore a

two-scan experience. There is no way to accurately and reliably
predict what your score has done without looking at the score again.

The Track Your Plaque 5 Stages of Reversal
I break the course of tracking plaque down into five distinct
phases, what I call “The Track Your Plaque 5 Stages of Reversal”:

Stage 1 Deceleration:
Slowing plaque growth to ≤30% per year
It’s an unambitious goal, but a modest effort can slow growth to
below the “natural” rate of 30% annual growth. This is the rate of
growth experienced by many people who take statin cholesterol
drugs (Lipitor®, Zocor®, etc.) as a sole strategy for combating heart
disease.

Slowing growth to less than 30% per year is regarded as an
unsatisfactory result in the Track Your Plaque program, one that can
be improved substantially. While this represents an improvement over
natural or accelerated plaque growth, substantial risk for heart attack
persists with this level of growth.

Stage 2 Deceleration: Slowing plaque growth to ≤20% per year
A modest reduction in heart attack risk occurs when growth of
plaque is slowed to 20% or less per year, but remains above 10%.
Stage 2, like Stage 1, is also a typical result for someone who does
nothing but adds a statin cholesterol drug and follows a conventional
(e.g., American Heart Association low-fat) nutritional program.

While existing data suggests that achieving Stage 2
Deceleration modestly reduces the risk of heart attack and the
likelihood of heart procedures, there’s plenty of room for
improvement.

Stage 3 Deceleration: Slowing plaque growth to ≤10% per year
Now we’re starting to have a real impact. When plaque grows
at 10% or less per year, it hasn’t stopped, but has slowed
considerably from its “natural” rate of growth. Plaque growth rates of
10% or less per year are associated with a substantial reduction in
heart attack. Achieving this rate of growth should prompt the
question, “What could I do just a little bit better?”

Stage 4 Zero Growth: Zero percent plaque growth per year
This means that plaque growth has halted. Even though plaque
has not reversed, zero percent plaque growth is associated with a
dramatic reduction in the risk of a heart attack (Raggi 2005). This is
probably due to the fact that, while calcium has not changed, the
active elements in plaque, like inflammatory cells and fatty material,
have been reabsorbed, resulting in reduced potential for plaque
rupture. In my experience and in published experience, the likelihood
of a heart attack is virtually zero at this stage.

Stage 5 Reversal: Reducing your heart scan score
This is the "holy grail," the goal we seek. It’s the prize that has
tantalized the hopeful who’ve been misled into dead ends like low-fat
diets, chelation, and other blind alleys. When achieved in the Track
Your Plaque program, it is truly an enormous personal success that I
would equate with graduating college, getting married, or being cured
of cancer.

Reducing your heart scan score signifies that coronary
atherosclerotic plaque has reversed—it is smaller in volume. All the
components of plaque have diminished, including inflammatory cells,
fatty tissue, and calcium. It also means that plaque has been
essentially inactivated, its potential for rupture virtually shut down. It
also means that your risk for heart attack is zero. In other words, in all
practicality, heart disease risk has been eliminated. It also means
that, although plaque is still present, the fatty portion of plaque has
been replaced by solid structural tissues that allow plaque to exist
quietly without inflammation and without activity that triggers rupture.
A decreasing heart scan score provides powerful indirect evidence
that plaque is becoming stable and inactive.

In my experience, the majority of people who adhere to Track
Your Plaque can slow or completely stop the otherwise inevitable
increase in score, though the time required to do so may vary. In the
first year, if all the proper steps are taken, a very realistic goal is to
achieve an increase in score of no more than 10% (Stage 3
Deceleration). The existing data suggest that a score increase of

<10% represents low-risk, and heart attack becomes less and less
likely as your plaque is inactivated.

A zero-percent increase or decrease in score is more
commonly encountered after two years on this program. Obtaining a
reduction of score with present treatments is therefore a one to two
year long process for most participants.

It is important to point out that the lower your starting score, the
more easily it is reduced. Scores of 200 or less have a much greater
chance of being lowered in the first year than scores >200. In our
program, 70% of people with starting scores of <200 succeed in the
first year. This drops to 30% success in the first year if your score is
>200, 50% by end of year 2. The message here is clear: the earlier
you start to Track Your Plaque, the more control you will have over
your heart’s future. Nonetheless, if you start with a higher score, don’t
give up hope. You may have to work harder and be patient, since this
process requires at least two years for most people to enjoy
substantial score-reducing or slowing effects.

Certain groups of people can anticipate greater difficulty in
controlling their score. People with established diabetes will
encounter more of a struggle. Unfortunately, if you’ve already been
diagnosed with diabetes, reducing your score is less likely. The Track
Your Plaque principles still do represent the most powerful prevention
program you can follow, but it is more likely that you simply
“decelerate” your plaque growth with these efforts, rather than
achieve score reduction as long as you remain diabetic. (However,
we will discuss how diabetics can supercharge their plaque control
effort using our unique Track Your Plaque nutrition principles that
reduce the diabetic tendency, many times reverse it!)

People with the metabolic syndrome who have a combination of
low HDL, high triglycerides, high blood pressure, blood sugar levels
>110 mg/dl, and are overweight, will also struggle to control plaque.
The metabolic syndrome generally precedes the onset of full-blown
diabetes but has a similar, though lesser, impact on plaque. The most
powerful tool for control of plaque growth for many people like this is
weight-loss achieved through the strategies discussed later in our
Track Your Plaque Nutritional Principles. It is possible to control

plaque with uncorrected metabolic syndrome in the picture, but it can
be considerably more difficult.

Once score stabilization (zero change) or reduction is achieved,
the need for any future scans to detect additional change is really an
individual decision. Since the score has started to drop, the most
important goal has been achieved. It is worth considering another
scan, however, if there is some significant change in your program.
For instance, significant weight gain, reversal of diabetes, or a
prolonged period of treatment interruption are among reasons for
repeating a scan despite initial control of the score.

The Track Your Plaque Study
In 2008, along with nutrition scientist, Dr. Susie Rockway, and
statistician, Dr. Mary Kwasny, both of Rush University Medical
Center, we published a portion of the Track Your Plaque experience
(Davis 2008).

In this group of 45 participants, within 18 months 20 participants
achieved a reduction in heart scan score of 14.5% (mean), while 22
participants experienced zero change in score. Of the 45 participants,
only 3 experienced an increase in score. One participant, a 52-year
old woman, achieved an incredible 64% reduction in heart scan
score, our best outcome to date.

In other words, 42 of 45 participants, or 93%, for all practical
purposes eliminated risk for heart disease by halting or reducing their
heart scan scores.

Why such a small number of participants? Actually, prior to
publication of this study, we had enrolled several hundred people in
the program. But once vitamin D was added to the Track Your Plaque
program, we began to witness faster and larger reductions in heart
scan scores in a greater proportion of participants. So this small study
included only the modest number of participants who had been taking
vitamin D for the duration of the study, but did not report the several
hundred people who had participated “pre-vitamin D.” (There’s much
more on the crucial role of vitamin D in plaque control later in the
book.)

Copyright 2010 Track Your Plaque, LLC

Low fat isn't one of TYP's strategies, since it didn't halt coronary calcium scores increase. Low-carb according to individual postprandial blood-glucose measurement is, since it did.
 

prioris

Senior Member
Messages
622
pamojja, could you give an in a nutshell summary of over all the key diet, supplements and other things used to achieve lower CAC.
 

pamojja

Senior Member
Messages
2,384
Location
Austria
In a nutshell:
  1. Finding of causes - which can be many - adaptation of strategies, and continuous evaluation through extensive laboratory testing
  2. Individual reduction of carbs by singling out most offending by testing post-prandial blood-glucose responses
  3. Basically optimizing serum 25(OH)D (60-80 ng/dl), thyroid and other hormones, Mg, Fish-oil, K2, Iodine, etc.

dietary wise:
  • Correct metabolic responses with elimination of wheat, cornstarch, and sugars; limited dairy
  • Don’t limit fats, but choose the right fats
  • Unlimited vegetables, some fruits
  • Unlimited raw nuts and seeds
  • Unlimited healthy oils
  • Foods Should Be Unprocessed

PS: can't help but add Linus Pauling's advise here: 'always listen to advise, but never believe blindly' ;)
 
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prioris

Senior Member
Messages
622
In a nutshell:
  1. Finding of causes - which can be many - adaptation of strategies, and continuous evaluation through extensive laboratory testing
  2. Individual reduction of carbs by singling out most offending by testing post-prandial blood-glucose responses
  3. Basically optimizing serum 25(OH)D (60-80 ng/dl), thyroid and other hormones, Mg, Fish-oil, K2, Iodine, etc.

excellent nutshell synopsis

What are some of the most common for number 1 and 2 that you can recall. Maybe top 3 would be nice.

Could you list (at least the most important and basic ones) what optimized serum and other values/levels ranges should be.
 

Gondwanaland

Senior Member
Messages
5,092
Brand new randomized controlled study
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5437600/
Nutr J. 2017; 16: 30.
Published online 2017 May 19. doi: 10.1186/s12937-017-0254-5
PMCID: PMC5437600
The effect of replacing saturated fat with mostly n-6 polyunsaturated fat on coronary heart disease: a meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials
Steven Hamley
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Abstract
Background
A cornerstone of conventional dietary advice is the recommendation to replace saturated fatty acids (SFA) with mostly n-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) to reduce the risk of coronary heart disease (CHD). Many clinical trials aimed to test this advice and have had their results pooled in several meta-analyses. However, earlier meta-analyses did not sufficiently account for major confounding variables that were present in some of those trials. Therefore, the aim of the study was to account for the major confounding variables in the diet heart trials, and emphasise the results from those trials that most accurately test the effect of replacing SFA with mostly n-6 PUFA.

Design
Clinical trials were identified from earlier meta-analyses. Relevant trials were categorised as ‘adequately controlled’ or ‘inadequately controlled’ depending on whether there were substantial dietary or non-dietary differences between the experimental and control groups that were not related to SFA or mostly n-6 PUFA intake, then were subject to different subgroup analyses.

Results
When pooling results from only the adequately controlled trials there was no effect for major CHD events (RR = 1.06, CI = 0.86–1.31), total CHD events (RR = 1.02, CI = 0.84–1.23), CHD mortality (RR = 1.13, CI = 0.91–1.40) and total mortality (RR = 1.07, CI = 0.90–1.26). Whereas, the pooled results from all trials, including the inadequately controlled trials, suggested that replacing SFA with mostly n-6 PUFA would significantly reduce the risk of total CHD events (RR = 0.80, CI = 0.65–0.98, P = 0.03), but not major CHD events (RR = 0.87, CI = 0.70–1.07), CHD mortality (RR = 0.90, CI = 0.70–1.17) and total mortality (RR = 1.00, CI = 0.90–1.10).

Conclusion
Available evidence from adequately controlled randomised controlled trials suggest replacing SFA with mostly n-6 PUFA is unlikely to reduce CHD events, CHD mortality or total mortality. The suggestion of benefits reported in earlier meta-analyses is due to the inclusion of inadequately controlled trials. These findings have implications for current dietary recommendations.
 

pamojja

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What are some of the most common for number 1 and 2 that you can recall. Maybe top 3 would be nice.

The most common causes? Understand that's the way of thinking in conventional medicine and its failure. They have identified a lipid and coagulation problem and medicate against, with almost no reduction in mortality. Or of low-fat vegan zealots. Like I have been most of my live, and still developed the disease full blown.

Now such 'walking-talking lab rats', as ptheut calls us investigating individuals, are no more that much interested in this statistical question - but what are our very own real causes for each oneself?

Many people ask: Doesn’t having a “perfect” cholesterol value
with treatment guarantee a reduction in score? Unfortunately, it does
not. How about a perfect lifestyle—strict adherence to diet, vigorous
exercise, adequate sleep, etc? This won’t guarantee that plaque
shrinks, either. Cholesterol values, even lipoproteins (discussed in
chapter 7) are only starting points to identify potential tools to shrink
your plaque. The only way to measure results in a specific individuals
to re-measure the quantity of plaque present: get another scan.
Reducing cholesterol, eating healthy, etc. are indeed helpful and
enhance the likelihood of stopping your score, but no specific
measure guarantees it.

Dr. Davis as clinician of many such 'walking-talking lab-rats' would be in a better position to answer this question without direct clinical importance.

One of course, could generalize my nut-shell saying above, and conclude deficiency of hormones, vitamin D, K, omega-3, iodine and Mg must then by the most common causes. And miss the most important point again: you have to have to find all your particular causes! Otherwise this is lost from the onset already.

Could you list (at least the most important and basic ones) what optimized serum and other values/levels ranges should be.

Since all bodily systems can be involved, or at least contribute, I would try to optimize them all:

http://www.lifeextension.com/Protocols/Appendix/Blood-Testing/Page-04

PS: and never ever get discouraged by temporary worsening lab-results. In the process of optimizing I made some progress, but am still very far from optimal. The dividends of this ongoing work in my case seem disproportional. Since I already reverted a walking-disability.

PPS: since testing all would not be affordable, get as many tests as possible prescribed by your GP. And then add most important out of your own pocket over time. Get at least CBC, kidney, liver and coagulation markers, thyroid and major hormones (fT3, cortisol, dhea, testosterone and estrogen). Lp(a), ApoA, ApoB, homocysteine, fibrinogen, CRP, HbA1c, Insulin or C-peptite, ferritin, 25(OH)D, ..and decide from there where to go further due to findings.
 
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