[ExI] Old Nutrition Studies

[James Clement]

On Sun, Aug 23, 2015 at 8:46 PM, Jason Resch <jasonresch at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> My only contention with what you say below is that according to the
> largest meta-study to date, it appears that saturated fats are harmless.
>
>
>
I'm a quantified selfer, and have spent the past few years extensively
reading nutrition studies (Calorie Restriction, Fasting, Ketogenic,
Vegetarian/Vegan, Paleolithic, etc.), as well as most of the popular health
books including Taubes, Sears, Cordain, Campbell, Wolf, Mosley, Perlmutter,
Sinatra, Volek & Phinney, Lustig, McDougal, and McDonald . From 2013 to
2014 I read over 2,500 papers. One thing that I noticed is that every data
set has outliers and while many variables are statistically significant for
particular biomarkers, there are always huge numbers of outliers.

In my own case, I've had my whole genome
<https://my.pgp-hms.org/profile/hu82E689> sequenced since 2009 and myself,
sister, parents, and other relatives 23andMe'd since 2010, and we all have
a genetic propensity towards Type II Diabetes. For the past several years
I've been taking my blood sugar measurements many times a day (fasting, and
immediately before and after meals) with a goal of achieving early morning
fasting blood sugar readings of 70 - 85 mg/dL and post-meal spikes of no
more than 120 mg/dL. I've been repeatedly surprised how small amounts of
carbohydrates on one day can raise my blood sugar the next morning and
throw it off for as much as 24 hours (e.g., goodbye my nightly microbrewed
beer). I also take my cholesterol measurements once a week (as soon as I
wake up, fasted) using CardioChek
<http://www.amazon.com/Cardio-Starter-Cholesterol-Analyzer-cholesterol/dp/B00408NZRS/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1440609156&sr=8-3&keywords=cardiochek>,
which can measure Total Cholesterol, HDL, and Triglycerides. My father (age
81) has super low LDL and high HDL, is thin, but has had two bypass
operations in his life. My mother has had high LDL and low HDL all of her
life (Total Chol over 300) and has no heart problems at 82 years of age.
Saturated fats (in my case coconut oil and high saturated-fat nuts) cause a
very significant increase in LDL cholesterol (measured by subtracting HDL
from Total Choles). I've proven this over and over to myself, by varying
only the saturated fat I'm eating and seeing what happens.

I personally think that LDL Particle Size
<http://mainheartclinic.com/2011/05/cholesterol-particle-size/>, C-Reactive
Protein, Homocysteine, Triglycerides, and blood sugar are far bigger risk
factors for coronary disease than total cholesterol. LDL particle size may
end up being the most important as having a LDL Type A profile (large,
fluffy particles) put one at much less risk for CVD than does Type B
profile (small, dense particles). Other than blood sugar (which is part of
the general CBC), however, none of these tests are generally requested by
doctors, even for people who have heart trouble, despite their relevance to
CVD risk. LEF and LabCorp both sell such tests DTC, however.

The upshot is that I don't think a single rule, such as "saturated fats are
bad" or "eating low carbs is good" (or their reverse) can apply to
everyone, when for any genetic risk there are usually 1/3 to 2/3 of humans
who have different variants from those of the favorable-risk group. I think
that people who want to really control their health need to read as much as
they can about the latest health information (from scientists or those
summarizing scientific work) and then test themselves rigorously and
frequently. In this regard, I think Mark Cuban
<http://www.emrandhipaa.com/emr-and-hipaa/2015/04/24/mark-cubans-suggestion-to-do-regular-blood-tests/>
was completely correct.

Best regards,

James
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