THE BIGGEST CULPRIT IN THE HEART DISEASE

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THE BIGGEST CULPRIT IN THE HEART DISEASE

http://newswithviews.com/Ellison/shane23.htm

Shane Ellison M. Sc.

September 23, 2006 NewsWithViews.com

Dedicated to my friend Frank Dannenberg

 

One minute you are enjoying a stroll in the park and the next you feel as if

an elephant just stepped on you. Clutching your chest and violently gasping

for air, you suffer the eventual outcome of heart disease: a heart attack. This

year alone, this silent killer will catch up to over a million Americans.[1]

Each and every one of them will die prematurely from this unfortunate scenario.

Worldwide, it will kill more people than any other affliction. This can be

stopped.

 

The underlying cause of a heart attack is narrowing of the arteries. The

process is known medically as atherosclerosis. Beating a dead horse,

cardiologists

confidently describe atherosclerosis as a plumbing problem: Fat and

cholesterol-laden gunk gradually builds up within the arteries. If this build-up

(plaque) grows thick enough, it eventually plugs an affected " pipe. " This

prevents

nutrients and oxygen-rich blood from reaching its intended tissue (technically

known as ischemia). Blood-starved tissue dies. When a part of the cardiac

muscle or the brain is affected, a heart attack or stroke occurs.

 

In 2004, Time magazine told the world that there's just one problem with the

cholesterol hypothesis: “sometimes it's dead wrong.†More than half of the

people who suffer from heart attacks have “low cholesterol.†And “highâ€

cholesterol (300-350mg/dL) is a natural and healthy part of aging. The higher

total

blood cholesterol the longer people live. Targeting this natural phenomenon,

drug companies have convinced people otherwise – while profiting immensely.

 

If fat and cholesterol were the culprit in heart disease due to their ability

to “plug the pipes,†then these ubiquitous substances would clog the entire

100,000 miles of adult veins, arteries and capillaries. Instead, 90% of the

time, heart disease is caused by the narrowing of the spaghetti-sized coronary

arteries – those that rest over the heart. The rest of the cardiovascular

system that nourishes the body remains perfectly healthy despite being rich in

cholesterol and fat. This common sense observation renders the cholesterol and

fat

theory of heart disease obsolete. If you want to avoid feeling like an

elephant is crushing your chest, look beyond cholesterol.

 

Coronary arteries bear little resemblance to pipes. Instead, they are made up

of muscle sandwiched between two “structural†layers. When the muscle of

arteries becomes inflamed “atherosclerosis†or heart disease can set in.

This is

initiated by damage to the innermost structural layer that faces the

bloodstream. Science has made great strides in identifying what causes damage to

this

layer.

 

Aside from smoking, the biggest culprit in today’s heart attack pandemic is

high blood sugar. It leads to a condition known as insulin resistance or early

Type-II diabetes. Suicide in slow motion, insulin resistance causes blood

sugar to float in the blood longer than it should. Muscle no longer vacuums it

from the bloodstream. Over time, blood sugar reacts with amino acids floating

nearby. The product of this reaction is a Swiss Army knife termed advance

glycated end (AGE) product.

 

AGE products cut and stab deep into structural layers of coronary

arteries.[2] Medically, this is termed glycation. The slicing and dicing

explains why

diabetics have four times the risk of heart attack relative to non-diabetics.

Overcome with high blood sugar, they face the butchering process of AGE

products.

 

 

Coronary arteries are most susceptible to AGE products due to the mechanical

stress in the region (heart beat). As the heart beats, the structural layer,

being made up of collagen and elastin, becomes sensitive to them. Arteries not

subject to mechanical stress do not expose the structural layer as readily.

Therefore, they are not as sensitive to the butchering.

 

Damage caused by AGE products leads to “crosslinking.†Once crosslinking

occurs, supple, healthy, coronary arteries become rigid – the same thing can

happen to skin. This is where the name atherosclerosis was derived. The term

combines two Greek words, athere (porridge) and sclerosis (hardening).

 

Crosslinking causes the body’s natural repair mechanism to take over. The

inflammation cascade begins. This is an age-old immunological defense mechanism.

Among the smooth muscle of coronary arteries, inflammation acts as nature’s

band aid. Plaque can be the end result.

 

Inflammation and plaque causes the cavity that allows blood flow through the

arteries to become narrow – occlusion occurs. The whole process of glycation,

crosslinking and inflammation can begin as early as three years of age!

 

Fortunately, narrowing of coronary arteries is not a death sentence. Arteries

do not become swollen so much that it shrinks the bloodstream to a pinpoint.

And healthy arteries have the ability to accommodate for the inflammation by “

relaxing†or dilating. This ensures that blood flow continues without

interruption – and that heart disease goes unnoticed.

 

This protection of dilation is primarily dependent on the short-lived

molecule known as nitric oxide.[3] Without it, excessive narrowing of arteries

can

manifest into hypertension, poor circulation, erectile dysfunction and decreased

tolerance to exercise.

 

Nutritional approaches such as l-arginine and grape seed extract that

maximize nitric oxide have proven to be a bonanza for heart disease patients who

want

to curb their annoying symptoms of heart disease naturally.

 

Most heart attacks and strokes creep up on victims when inflammation goes

haywire. This is typical among Americans because inflammation-causing sugar has

become a dominant ingredient in their food. Consequently, what should be

temporary for healing becomes long-term and deadly. The overly aggressive

inflammation cascade causes plaque (nature’s band aid) to rupture. This

rupturing

triggers the emergence of a blood clot (thrombus).

 

The combination of narrow arteries and a blood clot causes a person’s fate to

become sealed, along with their coronary arteries. This prevents blood from

reaching downstream to the heart and/or brain. The condition is known as “

ischemia.†Deprived of blood and oxygen, a heart attack or stroke is the

outcome.

The elephant is standing on its victim.

 

In summary, heart disease is not a disease of clogged pipes due to

cholesterol and fat. It is a disease of glycation, crosslinking, inflammation

and more

inflammation. The inflammation occurs within – not on – arterial walls.

Today,

it is typically the result of high blood sugar.

 

Understanding this working model of heart disease has highlighted a wildly

effective way to prevent the pandemic killer: Control blood sugar. Aside from

cinnamon, proper sunshine and green tea, other methods of controlling blood

sugar have been discovered:

 

1. Interval training can lower blood sugar by up to 40%.[4] To put it into

perspective, the commonly prescribed Metformin does so by a paltry 19% while

putting users at risk of obesity, if they can tolerate the constant vomiting and

diarrhea![5]

 

2. Nutritional supplementation with magnesium (400 mg/day) was found to

improve high blood sugar among elderly individuals.[6] Research shows that a

magnesium deficiency inhibits insulin from escorting glucose out of the

bloodstream

into muscles. The end result is insulin resistance and an increased risk of

heart attack. Magnesium aspartate has shown to be the best absorbed form of

magnesium.

 

3. Tannic acid from banaba mimics the actions of insulin by eliciting glucose

transport from the blood stream into muscle. The safe and effective

blood-sugar lowering effect of tannic acid has caught the attention of Big

Pharma. Many

drug companies are working rigorously to create a synthetic knock-off.

 

4. Increasing fiber intake with a tablespoon of psyllium husk prevents

dangerous spikes in blood sugar after a meal.

 

 

Controlling blood sugar has become the absolute hottest area of research. Not

only does it suggest a single way of ameliorating heart disease, but also a

host of other diseases caused by high blood sugar. These include but are not

limited to diabetes, cancer and even Alzheimer’s! Instead of dosing patients

up

with a handful of drugs to treat a handful of diseases, controlling blood

sugar naturally is one remedy for all three!

 

Footnotes:

 

1, When every Minute Counts: Improving heart attack care.

2, Chemists know this process as " glycation. " It was discovered as early as

1914 by French chemist Louis-Camille Maillard.

3, Scientists Robert F. Furchgott, PhD, Louis J. Ignarro, PhD, and Ferid

Murad, MD, PhD received the Nobel Prize for the paramount discovery concerning

nitric oxide.

4, Paul Poirier2, Angelo Tremblay, Claude Catellier, Gilles Tancrède,

Caroline Garneau and André Nadeau. Impact of Time Interval from the Last Meal

on

Glucose Response to Exercise in Subjects with Type 2 Diabetes. The Journal of

Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism Vol. 85, No. 8 2860-2864.

5, Exercise nearly as successful as drugs at lowering blood sugar

6, Micronutrient Information Center

 

© 2006 Shane Ellison -

 

 

--

 

Shane holds a Master's degree in organic chemistry and has first-hand

industry experience with drug research, design and synthesis. With his keen

ability

to sift through scientific literature and weed out fact from fiction, Shane has

empowered thousands to assert their health freedom by saying " no " to

prescription drugs. Learn more about his books Health Myths Exposed and The

Hidden

Truth about Cholesterol-Lowering Drugs.

 

Get 6-months of his FREE Life-Saving Health Briefs at www.healthmyths.net.

 

E-Mail: shane