Word: ldl
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...Fred may feel great, but every time he eats, his bloodstream is flooded with fatty particles called chylomicrons, which transport triglycerides and cholesterol out of the intestines to the rest of | his body. Soon Fred's liver is busy mopping up chylomicrons and is unable to cope with excess LDL in the blood. The surfeit of cholesterol particles then begins circulating freely through the body. Unless it is stopped, it can lead to the formation of deadly plaque...
Once filled, the HDL particles must get their load of cholesterol back to the liver for excretion. Some researchers theorize that cholesterol collected in the HDL particle is transferred to a VLDL ferryboat circulating in the bloodstream; the VLDL then metamorphoses into an LDL, which is picked up by an LDL receptor in the liver. Others think HDL may in fact be a passive player -- a sort of biological signal light that indicates how efficiently excess cholesterol is being removed, without necessarily taking any direct role...
...research at the University of Southern California, reported on a study in which 162 nonsmoking men who had undergone coronary- bypass surgery were put on a low-fat diet; 80 of them were also treated with niacin and colestipol. Among the drug-treated group, HDL levels increased 37%, while LDL decreased 43% and triglycerides went down 22%. Blankenhorn found evidence that arterial disease had been halted in 61% of the drug- treated patients, compared with 39% who were treated by diet alone. Moreover, 16% of the drug-treated group, vs. only 3.6% of the others, showed an improvement...
Those dramatic results were not achieved by increasing HDL alone, although Blankenhorn says there is strong evidence that "high HDL is good for you." His study showed that obstructed arteries benefited most from decreased LDL. Lower levels of triglycerides, he found, may also play an important role, a possibility that has emerged from other studies as well. At Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Dr. Antonio Gotto Jr. discovered that his heart-bypass patients "almost without exception" have lower levels of HDL and slightly higher levels of triglycerides than people without heart disease. One theory is that excess triglycerides somehow...
...prolonging elixir or merely a bit player in a metabolic process whose intricate workings are not yet fully understood. The signs so far are encouraging, but the public does not have to wait for all the answers about HDL in order to do something about preventing heart disease. The LDL story, after all, is already clear: the lower the LDL, the lower the risk of heart disease. For most people in the Western world, basic changes in eating habits and life-style can drastically reduce or eliminate the threat of heart attack. Declares Dr. Bernadine Healy, president of the American...