Word: gofman
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Guilt by Association. Both camps may be partly right, judging from a report given last week by the University of California's Dr. John W. Gofman to a meeting of doctors called by the New York Heart Association, Inc. There is strong evidence, said Dr. Gofman, that although many giant molecules circulating in the blood contain cholesterol, only certain special types seem to be associated with atherosclerosis. Definitely accused of "guilt by association" with atherosclerosis: giant molecules with a molecular weight of about 1,000,000, which contain 30% cholesterol, and have an ultracentrifuge flotation rate...
Through the cooperation of dozens of doctors in the San Francisco Bay area, Dr. Gofman and his fellow workers have studied what they call "Sf 10-20 molecules" in the blood of 1,553 people. Most (900) were normal, but more than 600 suffered from heart, artery or kidney disease, high blood pressure or diabetes. Notable concentration of Sf 10-20 molecules were found in the blood of nearly all patients who had at some time had a heart attack (usually after a blood clot closes an artery supplying the heart muscle). This fact, said Dr. Gofman, was significant because...
...those with high blood pressure or coronary insufficiency. Perhaps even more significant for the future: more than half of the men and a third of the women with no known disease of the heart or arteries showed high levels of Sf 10-20 molecules. These people, Dr. Gofman suggested, may be those who, in time, will develop atherosclerosis...
Most hopeful was Dr. Gofman's report of the patients' response to a low-fat low-cholesterol diet.* After a few weeks there was a marked reduction in the concentration of abnormal molecules in their blood. The patients who had once had a heart attack showed just as much improvement as healthy men. But, Dr. Gofman emphasized, there was no evident connection between diet and the total amount of cholesterol of all kinds in the blood. Fortunately, the abnormal molecules, which seem to be involved in atherosclerosis are the ones that can be largely controlled by diet...