Word: ldl
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...Rogosin Institute, Lewis became a guinea pig in an experimental treatment program. Once a week he would drive to the hospital to undergo a procedure called LDL-pheresis, a filtering process that removes from the blood the most dangerous form of cholesterol, known as LDL (for low-density lipoprotein). Now, after a year of treatments, Lewis is remarkably improved. His once crippling angina is "almost nonexistent," he reports. Thick deposits of cholesterol that used to be visible on his hands have largely vanished. He has resumed physical activity. "I'm walking half a mile in eight or nine minutes...
...procedure that has given Lewis a future somewhat resembles kidney dialysis. Patients undergoing LDL-pheresis sit or recline for three to four hours as their blood circulates through two specialized devices. The first separates blood cells from blood plasma; the second filters the plasma through a jar of porous beads coated with an antibody that traps LDL. The beauty of the procedure, says its developer, German Biochemist Wilhelm Stoffel, is that "the antibody picks out only LDL." Other important blood components, including a valuable form of cholesterol called HDL (high-density lipoprotein), are all returned to the patient. In fact...
...alternative approach to unclogging the arteries is based on what scientists have learned about cholesterol. Plaques are more likely to form when blood cholesterol is high, and particularly when the cholesterol takes the form known as "low-density lipoprotein" (LDL). By lowering the levels of cholesterol in the blood or by ensuring that most of it occurs as "high density lipoprotein" (HDL), the risk of heart attack can be substantially reduced. Although, several drugs have been developed to improve blood cholesterol levels, most have been associated with severe side effects...
...person eats too many saturated fats, however, liver cells suppress the production of LDL receptors. Cholesterol then collects in artery walls in plaques, the hallmark of atherosclerosis. Conversely, a low-cholesterol diet stimulates the output of new receptors, thereby preventing heart disease...
...popularly regarded as an enemy, the body needs it to manufacture new cell membranes, steroid hormones and bile acids. Made primarily in the liver and also obtained through food, cholesterol travels through the bloodstream in round bundles of fat and protein called lipoproteins. Like Venus's-flytraps, vacant LDL receptors snare the passing packets. The lipoproteins are rapidly broken down in the cell, and the cholesterol is freed for use, while the receptor returns to the membrane, ready for prey...