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Total cholesterol and mortality by sex and age:study of 12.8M adults
- aszantu 3y agosee cholesterolcode.com There's evidence for another phenotype called lean mass hyper responder. Basically you can eat white bread and cheap sausage for a week, that will cut your cholesterol in half. But you'll feel horrible. Also glycerides will go up.
- jokowueu 3y agoHuh my chelesterol got much higher after exercising and eating healthy for about 6 months , it made nonsense to me , I another test and my doctor didn't understand why . For other health reasons I stopped working out and eventually started eating junk food . My chelesterol got cut in half !
- sab24 3y agoThe article basically states that a higher cholesterol (up to a certain point) reduces the hazard ratio. Therefore cutting your cholesterol in half does seem to increase your health risk (assuming your cholesterol was not extremely high).
- jokowueu 3y agoIt was very high and I beleive it's genetic , my mother tried all available statins then moved from pcsk9 inhibitors to inclisiran and now her chelesterol is in check
- imhoguy 3y agoIANAD, but that may be explained by body fat being reduced as it gets into blood as cholesterol and triglycerides to be burned.
- cuchoi 3y agoAny saturated fats when eating healthy? (eggs, coconut oil, other tropical oils, butter, cheese, margarine, etc)
- jokowueu 3y agoOlive oil and omega 3 daily
- grvdrm 3y agoThank you for this link. Going down the rabbit hole!
- aszantu 3y agohappy diving :D
- artismetal 3y ago[flagged]
- clouddrover 3y ago> mortality by sex and age I think sex will get me before age does.
- corethree 3y agoI took one look at the abstract and I completely understood it. No. Seriously does someone understand the abstract and is able to summarize it in readable English?
- RandomLensman 3y agoMy very crude understanding would be (if I read the abstract right): Too low total cholesterol is bad, too high is bad (that U shaped relationship between total cholesterol and mortality, also holds for age-sex groups). With the link between high and bad weaker than between low and good.
- krab 3y agoThe abstract seems pretty clear to me. In essence low cholesterol is associated with even greater risk than high cholesterol. The optimum is somewhere around 200 mg/dL. The study was performed over a large group of Koreans over more than ten years. The trick to read scientific papers is that unless you're in that specific field, skimming doesn't work. You have to read sentence by sentence and sometimes stop and look up terms you don't understand for the whole to make sense.
- gala8y 3y agoThat's it. Though I did total opposite of detailed reading. I rounded all numbers to have them in ranges, trying to skim over details (but read slowly nevertheless). Once you understand what U-shape curve is and that it is probably key to the whole thing, you can unpack the abstract. You just need to know what U curve is.
- corethree 3y ago>The abstract seems pretty clear to me. In essence low cholesterol is associated with even greater risk than high cholesterol. The optimum is somewhere around 200 mg/dL. The study was performed over a large group of Koreans over more than ten years. This sentence is an EVEN easier read and is more suitable candidate for an abstract.
- pazimzadeh 3y ago
- sph 3y agoThe misinformation on cholesterol is at an all-time high. Here's a good deep-dive on the subject: "Dr. Paul Mason — Why your doctor thinks cholesterol is bad" https://youtu.be/j-nq60_oEIc?si=KX9MFMrC43NDJtVy https://youtu.be/j-nq60_oEIc?si=KX9MFMrC43NDJtVy Then maybe follow up with "The shady truth about statins" https://youtu.be/I7r4j1u42V8?si=QHxg7UDQFcBkMt2p https://youtu.be/I7r4j1u42V8?si=QHxg7UDQFcBkMt2p --- tl;dr: total cholesterol is a terrible health metric on its own, and depending on your diet, it might be both associated with shorter lifespan, or longevity. More valid diagnostic tools are available, but far too expensive for the GP office. And statins simply reduce this useless figure in a vacuum, but are not correlated at all with improved health.
- bad_user 3y agoIndeed. The videos from that “Low Carb Down Under” channel are as scientifically accurate as anti-vaxxing or homeopathy.
- sph 3y agoPeople that believe scientists and qualified medical doctors, operating on current research, are quacks because their research deviates on 50-year old advice, simply have no idea how science works and evolves. Please point me to anti-vax and homeopathic panels going over actual peer-approved studies. Those videos I linked contain dozens of research papers and data for you to cross-reference, but given your snarky one-line dismissal with no further elaboration, I don't think there's any intelligent discussion to be had here.
- bad_user 3y agoI've been in the Keto community for years, until I realized that the whole community is full of quacks, indeed. There's no intelligent discussion to be had because the Keto “science” has been proven wrong repeatedly. At this point, I don't think it's worthy of respect, actually. And don't get me wrong, I don't want censorship or anything of the kind. People believing that crap will eventually realize that it hurts them, whereas a small minority will double down. The problem with the Keto “science”, and its arguments, is that the goal posts are moved, much like anything non-falsifiable, and the studies that are supposedly in their favor are cherry-picked, or misinterpreted. Whereas, they dismiss studies or reviews that prove them wrong, even if high quality (e.g., RCT, pre-registered), based on non-scientific grounds (e.g., not long enough, use of the wrong proxy markers, etc.). What's ironic is that we do have year-long, high-quality studies on nutrition. Diabetes and cardiovascular disease are understood fairly well, but they rarely attack those. They are also full of double standards, crying “conflict of interest” from the “sugar and oil industry”, while not observing the conflict of interest in their backyard, including the conflict of interest from those peddling the nonsense. And all the nonsense they spew on cholesterol is accompanied by a conspiracy theory involving Ancel Keys and his limited selection of countries to study. They conveniently ignore the facts that a selection had to be made post-world-war, as few countries had data available, and those studies are pretty good, actually, and his findings were replicated. Keto and conspiracy theories go hand in hand. When I made the comparison with anti-vaxxing or homeopathy, it's quite a literal comparison. They have conferences and are “science”-based too.
- seewhydee 3y agoFrom Fig. 2, it looks like the "hazard ratio" is minimized at a total cholesterol level of around 230 mg/dL, with both higher and lower total cholesterol levels associated with higher mortality. However, medical advice (see e.g. Cleveland Clinic page below) routinely asserts 200 mg/dL as the maximum for the normal range, with 230 mg/dL being "borderline high" and approaching the "high" band. https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/articles/11920-cholesterol-numbers-what-do-they-mean https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/articles/11920-cholest... In the discussion section of the paper, the authors write: "The current cholesterol guidelines are heavily based on heart disease risk and recommend a TC range of <200 mg/dL as desirable. TC range <200 mg/dL, however, may not be necessarily a sign of good health when other diseases are considered. The diseases associated with lower TC levels and potential mechanisms have not been conclusively identified." Time to eat more cheeseburgers?
- noobermin 3y agoSo the data is interesting and speaks for itself, but of course, let's ask the ancillary but potentially relevant questions: why sci rep? Why isn't this in a higher impact journal? Is sci rep even read in medicine?
- deugtniet 3y agoScientific reports is read in many places, including in medicine. Regarding your 'low-impact' comment I have a few thoughts. 1. Although this is a large study, they do not find any world shocking new insights that are otherwise found in other studies. Cholesterol phenotypes are very well studied. Changing a guideline is usually not done based on a study of a single population. 2. They do not account for medication usage which confounds results. 3. They do not find a causal relationship between cholesterol and mortality, only provide an association.
- cuchoi 3y agoThis doesn't mean you should increase your cholesterol. Low cholesterol (hypocholesterolemia) is commonly observed in critically ill patients. This could be driving the correlation and doesn't mean that if you lower your cholesterol you will increase your risk of dying.
- TylerLives 3y agoDespite the correlation between higher cholesterol and mortality, increased cholesterol might be a defense mechanism. Possible explanation, from: https://raypeat.com/articles/articles/cholesterol-longevity.shtml https://raypeat.com/articles/articles/cholesterol-longevity.... >Although cholesterol is protective against oxidative and cytolytic damage, the chronic free radical exposure will oxidize it. During the low cholesterol turnover of hypothyroidism, the oxidized variants of cholesterol will accumulate, so cholesterol loses its protective functions. >In the healthy organism, cholesterol is constantly being synthesized, and constantly converted into steroid hormones, and, in the liver, into the bile salts that are secreted to emulsify fats in the intestine. Thyroid hormone and vitamin A are used in the process of converting cholesterol into pregnenolone, the immediate precursor of progesterone and DHEA. Anything that interfered with these processes would be disastrous for the organism. The supply of cholesterol, thyroid and vitamin A must always be adequate for the production of steroid hormones and bile salts. When stress suppresses thyroid activity, increased cholesterol probably compensates to some extent by permitting more progesterone to be synthesized. >In very young people, the metabolic rate is very high, and the rapid conversion of cholesterol into pregnenolone, DHEA, and progesterone usually keeps the level of cholesterol in the blood low. In the 1930s, a rise in the concentration of cholesterol was considered to be one of the most reliable ways to diagnose hypothyroidism (1936 Yearbook of Neurology, Psychiatry, and Endocrinology, E.L. Sevringhaus, editor, Chicago, p. 533). With aging, the metabolic rate declines, and the increase of cholesterol with aging is probably a spontaneous regulatory process, supporting the synthesis of the protective steroids, especially the neurosteroids in the brain and retina.
- peter_retief 3y agoMany of the risk factors are symptoms of an underlying condition, often by treating the symptom you may get unintended results. Both high and low cholesterol correlate to higher mortality as would be expected.
- DiabloD3 3y agoUnfortunately, this study failed to measure cholesterol oxidization. 20 years ago, when this study started, it was still considered bleeding edge science to even consider that (or a proxy, particle size), and they recorded all of the wrong values A quick glance through the paper does not indicate they measured particle size. It also seems they may have measured LDL/HDL/TG fraction, but then did nothing with it (which basically puts this paper at the technological level of the 1950s). Neither total cholesterol nor LDL/HDL/TG fractions can accurately predict mortality, but particle size can. LDL-P et al tests are quickly becoming the norm as younger doctors enter the field, and their education is more up to date than their older peers.
- nxobject 3y agoAs a complete layperson, it's interesting how eerily intuitive particle size is as a measure of risk: "bigger particles clog up your blood vessels more".
- xenonite 3y agoI understand that the diameter tells whether the LDL is oxidized, which would be bad.
- Try1275 3y agoIt's a shame that it needs younger doctors for things to change if the science and technology is already there.
- the-dude 3y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck%27s_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck%27s_principle
- mfer 3y agoCholesterol tests are common but the better test is to measure APOB. Something that’s not usually covered by insurance and many doctors don’t know about because it’s newer. I noticed heart disease was called out as a co-morbidity to high cholesterol. A lot of cardiovascular disease is caused by excess LDL cholesterol.
- zapdrive 3y ago>> Total cholesterol and mortality by sex and age: They should have done the study based on gender, rather than sex. This study is discriminatory against trans people so its inherently anti-trans.
- xchip 3y agoInteresting opinion, although scientist should know better.
- seethedeaduu 3y agoThis guy is trolling but it would be interesting to see if it is dependent on sex hormones or something else.
- FrustratedMonky 3y agoFrom this, seems like my total is too low. Below 200. I should go out and eat some ribs, and pump it up to target 220.
- cuchoi 3y agoThis doesn't mean you should increase your cholesterol. Low cholesterol (hypocholesterolemia) is commonly observed in critically ill patients. This could be driving the correlation and doesn't mean that if you lower your cholesterol you will increase your risk of dying.
- cuchoi 3y agoHere there is a video explaining these results (and why you shouldn't increase your cholesterol): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3lHHnOHyr8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3lHHnOHyr8