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Cholesterol Clarity: What the HDL is Wrong with My Numbers?
Are you confused by what your cholesterol levels really say about your health? Don't you wish someone could just spell it out in simple English and tell you what, if anything, you need to do to improve your heart and overall health? That's precisely what Cholesterol Clarity is designed to do. Jimmy Moore, a prolific and highly respected health blogger and podcaster, interviewed 28 of the world's top health experts from various fields to give you the complete lowdown on cholesterol. He and his co-author, family practitioner and researcher Dr. Eric Westman, have broken down this critical information for you to know what is most important and what is not.
Within the pages of this book you'll learn invaluable lessons,
- Why your LDL-C and total cholesterol numbers may not be as important in determining your health as your doctor may think
- The undeniable negative role chronic inflammation plays in your health
- Why cholesterol-lowering statin drugs don't necessarily solve your heart health concerns
- Why your doctor should be testing for LDL particles and particle size
- Why HDL and triglycerides are far more predictive of health concerns than LDL-C and total cholesterol
- Why consuming saturated fat is good and why carbohydrates are detrimental to attaining the best cholesterol numbers
- Why there is a growing number of physicians, researchers and nutritionists who believe treating cholesterol numbers is virtually irrelevant.
You won't find this kind of comprehensive, cutting-edge, expert-driven cholesterol information all in one place anywhere else. Did you know, for instance, that you don't have to eat a low-fat diet, take a statin drug, or eat more of the so-called "healthy" whole grains to get your cholesterol levels where they need to be? Learn what really works from the best experts on the subject. Cholesterol Clarity will not only tell you what your LDL, HDL, triglycerides, and other key cholesterol markers really mean, but it will arm you with what you can do nutritionally to become as optimally healthy as you can possibly be!
Featured Dr. William Davis, Dr. Ronald Krauss, Dr. Uffe Ravnskov, Dr. Robert Lustig, Dr. Duane Graveline, Dr. Jonny Bowden, Dr. Chris Masterjohn, Dr. Malcolm Kendrick, Dr. John Briffa, Dr. Thomas Dayspring, Dr. Fred Pescatore, Gary Taubes and over a dozen more!
Within the pages of this book you'll learn invaluable lessons,
- Why your LDL-C and total cholesterol numbers may not be as important in determining your health as your doctor may think
- The undeniable negative role chronic inflammation plays in your health
- Why cholesterol-lowering statin drugs don't necessarily solve your heart health concerns
- Why your doctor should be testing for LDL particles and particle size
- Why HDL and triglycerides are far more predictive of health concerns than LDL-C and total cholesterol
- Why consuming saturated fat is good and why carbohydrates are detrimental to attaining the best cholesterol numbers
- Why there is a growing number of physicians, researchers and nutritionists who believe treating cholesterol numbers is virtually irrelevant.
You won't find this kind of comprehensive, cutting-edge, expert-driven cholesterol information all in one place anywhere else. Did you know, for instance, that you don't have to eat a low-fat diet, take a statin drug, or eat more of the so-called "healthy" whole grains to get your cholesterol levels where they need to be? Learn what really works from the best experts on the subject. Cholesterol Clarity will not only tell you what your LDL, HDL, triglycerides, and other key cholesterol markers really mean, but it will arm you with what you can do nutritionally to become as optimally healthy as you can possibly be!
Featured Dr. William Davis, Dr. Ronald Krauss, Dr. Uffe Ravnskov, Dr. Robert Lustig, Dr. Duane Graveline, Dr. Jonny Bowden, Dr. Chris Masterjohn, Dr. Malcolm Kendrick, Dr. John Briffa, Dr. Thomas Dayspring, Dr. Fred Pescatore, Gary Taubes and over a dozen more!
260 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 25, 2013
321 people are currently reading
637 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 94 reviews
May 20, 2015
An excellent book for anyone following (or interested in following) a ketogenic/low carb diet, and who is concerned about their cholesterol level, particularly if you live in America.
Very well written and easy to understand - well, most of it - and all possible avenues are explored in depth.
Note - for those living in Britain and perhaps other countries too: You will need help understanding the figures in the book. On page 236 there is a cholesterol conversion chart.....mg/dl to mmol/L , and on page 238 there is a triglyceride conversion chart for mg/dl to mmol/L. But the book does not contain conversion figures for HDL and LDL readings for those of us in Europe, which I found rather limiting.
Finally, it's difficult to write a medical book with humour, but Jimmy Moore has succeeded, and his enthusiasm is wonderfully catching.
Very well written and easy to understand - well, most of it - and all possible avenues are explored in depth.
Note - for those living in Britain and perhaps other countries too: You will need help understanding the figures in the book. On page 236 there is a cholesterol conversion chart.....mg/dl to mmol/L , and on page 238 there is a triglyceride conversion chart for mg/dl to mmol/L. But the book does not contain conversion figures for HDL and LDL readings for those of us in Europe, which I found rather limiting.
Finally, it's difficult to write a medical book with humour, but Jimmy Moore has succeeded, and his enthusiasm is wonderfully catching.
February 7, 2014
The most current (as in the past 20 years) of research clearly shows that heart health is dependent on much more than just cholesterol levels. There are both better ways to assess and maintain heart health than simply keeping our cholesterol low. This message needs to get out there because the mainstream media and medical advice is decades behind this. The message needs to get out there and books like this are really important. Unfortunately although I really wanted to love the book it isn't quite as clear as the title suggests. I think the research is good and the experts are well selected. You provide a lot of information that hasn't made it to the general public yet, some of which will save lives. It is just that I think the field of heart disease research is still working through theories which are not all completely formed. This lends itself to occasional fuzziness in some areas. It is also challenging to be talking about a new paradigm of cholesterol interpretation and heart research when we aren't quite ready to fully let go of the old. You spend an entire chapter telling us why high cholesterol is actually better for you (particularly women) but then in the quiz in the back give healthy scores to people with really (sub 150) cholesterol scores. How does this work? I feel bemused. Perhaps if you had spent more time explaining the ratings for the profiles in the back it would be clearer to me. I liked the quiz, it just confused me and left me feeling very unclear about all that I had just read. So I do like the book. I think this is information needs to get out to the general public. Stop being afraid of fat! Cut your carbs not your fats! Get better tests rather than just a basic lipid panel! I'm behind that 100%. Unfortunately, the choppy nature of the writing (all those expert opinions are great but didn't flow very well) and some small inconsistencies made it a little confusing. So I'll certainly be sharing parts of this book but I find it hard to recommend as a whole package to anyone who isn't really serious about wrestling with some hard ideas. Because we may know a lot more about heart health than we ever did before and a lot of what we think we know is wrong, but we still aren't completely clear on all the moving pieces of the puzzle.
April 6, 2018
I did not like the book at all. The same information was told over and over again. The main points of the book are the following:
• Do not take statin drugs. Many doctors prescribe statin drugs to patients with high cholesterol.
• Eat a high-fat low carb diet.
• High cholesterol is good.
I did not gain any other knowledge besides those three things. I already know about the ketogenic diet and the great benefits from eating a high fat, low carb diet.
The majority of the book is quotes from several experts, which are highlighted at the beginning of the book. Jimmy Moore, the author, has a few things to say with some testimonies. But mostly the book is a collaboration of one or two paragraph comments from experts pasted into a document to create a book.
I wanted to read this book because I loved the recipe book he co-authored, “The Ketogenic Cookbook: Nutritious Low-Carb, High-Fat Paleo Meals to Heal Your Body”. I do recommend this book. https://amzn.to/2EqAsEu
• Do not take statin drugs. Many doctors prescribe statin drugs to patients with high cholesterol.
• Eat a high-fat low carb diet.
• High cholesterol is good.
I did not gain any other knowledge besides those three things. I already know about the ketogenic diet and the great benefits from eating a high fat, low carb diet.
The majority of the book is quotes from several experts, which are highlighted at the beginning of the book. Jimmy Moore, the author, has a few things to say with some testimonies. But mostly the book is a collaboration of one or two paragraph comments from experts pasted into a document to create a book.
I wanted to read this book because I loved the recipe book he co-authored, “The Ketogenic Cookbook: Nutritious Low-Carb, High-Fat Paleo Meals to Heal Your Body”. I do recommend this book. https://amzn.to/2EqAsEu
July 23, 2016
Cholesterol Clarity explains that the cholesterol hypothesis is well and truly dead! The current obsession with cholesterol levels and avoiding saturated fat and cholesterol in the diet is utterly misguided.
This book was very convincing on this point but if you'd like a far more in depth explanation and history I'd highly recommend 'Good Calories, Bad Calories' by Gary Taubes. This book is also impeccably referenced and argued.
This book explains that:
- High cholesterol levels don't cause heart disease
- A high fat diet, saturated or otherwise, does not affect blood cholesterol levels
- Saturated fats are not in any way damaging or dangerous
- Statins offer very little protection against heart disease and are not worth taking for most people, especially women
- Concepts of good and bad cholesterol are ridiculous and 'madcap'
- Statin drugs are the most profitable drug ever and make pharmaceutical companies billions and billions of dollars a year and this is why the cholesterol hypothesis continues to be so relentlessly promoted
- Matthias Rath (as supported by Linus Pauling) has part of the heart disease puzzle right when he talks about the role of low vitamin C levels in causing heart disease
- Statin drugs have many dangerous side-effects such as muscle pain, depression and progressive memory loss, death and hideous deformed babies when given during pregnancy
- Low cholesterol levels are bad for your health
- The war against cholesterol, using statins, comes close to a crime against humanity
I'd also recommend The Great Cholesterol Con by M. Kendrick (aside from the last chapter which is not great) or The Cholesterol Myths by Uffe Ravnskov or Mary Enig PhD's book on healthy fats and oils. Reading excellent books on how to treat or avoid heart problems such as 'Detoxify or Die' or 'The Cholesterol Hoax' by Dr Sherry Rogers and books on diet by Nora Gedgaudas and others would be a good next step for health.
Cholesterol Clarity is an easy read, if a bit repetitive and needlessly long. All the MANY quotes by doctors throughout were brilliant! I'm a big fan of living as healthily as you can and putting your focus and money there and then not bothering to get all the complex triglyceride tests etc. - as were some of the doctors quoted in this book so eloquently. So I'd have preferred all the complex cholesterol testing information in this book to be relegated to an appendix at the back and taken out of the main text.
This book (or another one like it) is essential reading if you're an egg yolk, cholesterol or saturated fat dodger and especially if you're taking a statin drug. Don't fall for the statin drug hype and be very wary of any doctor that does!
Jodi Bassett, The Hummingbirds' Foundation for M.E. (HFME) and Health, Healing & Hummingbirds (HHH)
This book was very convincing on this point but if you'd like a far more in depth explanation and history I'd highly recommend 'Good Calories, Bad Calories' by Gary Taubes. This book is also impeccably referenced and argued.
This book explains that:
- High cholesterol levels don't cause heart disease
- A high fat diet, saturated or otherwise, does not affect blood cholesterol levels
- Saturated fats are not in any way damaging or dangerous
- Statins offer very little protection against heart disease and are not worth taking for most people, especially women
- Concepts of good and bad cholesterol are ridiculous and 'madcap'
- Statin drugs are the most profitable drug ever and make pharmaceutical companies billions and billions of dollars a year and this is why the cholesterol hypothesis continues to be so relentlessly promoted
- Matthias Rath (as supported by Linus Pauling) has part of the heart disease puzzle right when he talks about the role of low vitamin C levels in causing heart disease
- Statin drugs have many dangerous side-effects such as muscle pain, depression and progressive memory loss, death and hideous deformed babies when given during pregnancy
- Low cholesterol levels are bad for your health
- The war against cholesterol, using statins, comes close to a crime against humanity
I'd also recommend The Great Cholesterol Con by M. Kendrick (aside from the last chapter which is not great) or The Cholesterol Myths by Uffe Ravnskov or Mary Enig PhD's book on healthy fats and oils. Reading excellent books on how to treat or avoid heart problems such as 'Detoxify or Die' or 'The Cholesterol Hoax' by Dr Sherry Rogers and books on diet by Nora Gedgaudas and others would be a good next step for health.
Cholesterol Clarity is an easy read, if a bit repetitive and needlessly long. All the MANY quotes by doctors throughout were brilliant! I'm a big fan of living as healthily as you can and putting your focus and money there and then not bothering to get all the complex triglyceride tests etc. - as were some of the doctors quoted in this book so eloquently. So I'd have preferred all the complex cholesterol testing information in this book to be relegated to an appendix at the back and taken out of the main text.
This book (or another one like it) is essential reading if you're an egg yolk, cholesterol or saturated fat dodger and especially if you're taking a statin drug. Don't fall for the statin drug hype and be very wary of any doctor that does!
Jodi Bassett, The Hummingbirds' Foundation for M.E. (HFME) and Health, Healing & Hummingbirds (HHH)
December 30, 2022
This book was not written by a doctor or dietitian. Take that into consideration. I did. It does have quotes from doctors peppered throughout (often 2-3 per page) and while they split the author’s thoughts up and often made his line of thought difficult to follow, I found those a valuable source of information. I also had to filter out some of the “keto-forward” thinking. The author also sells books about the the keto diet, so I expected that to feature prominently, and it did. But he also spoke badly about the Mediterranean diet specifically, which I found to be odd. Maybe that diet has changed in the 9 years since this book was published, but he accused it of promoting a low fat, high carbohydrate lifestyle, which it does not (except, I suppose, in comparison to keto)?
He often referred to “healthy fats, such as butter, red meat, and eggs,” without bringing up olive oil or avocados except in a few rare instances. He did often refer to plant based fats as unhealthy, making it sound as if olive oil would be lumped into this category.
I agree that people should reduce their intake of sugar and processed foods. That’s pretty universally accepted science. But I struggle to see a ketogenic diet as the only heart healthy diet, especially considering my mother passed away from heart disease 2 months ago after following a ketogenic diet off and on (mostly on) for years.
ETA: The book could have been MUCH shorter. He repeated himself a lot, and seemed unorganized.
He often referred to “healthy fats, such as butter, red meat, and eggs,” without bringing up olive oil or avocados except in a few rare instances. He did often refer to plant based fats as unhealthy, making it sound as if olive oil would be lumped into this category.
I agree that people should reduce their intake of sugar and processed foods. That’s pretty universally accepted science. But I struggle to see a ketogenic diet as the only heart healthy diet, especially considering my mother passed away from heart disease 2 months ago after following a ketogenic diet off and on (mostly on) for years.
ETA: The book could have been MUCH shorter. He repeated himself a lot, and seemed unorganized.
August 19, 2016
I preferred The Great Cholesterol Con: The Truth About What Really Causes Heart Disease and How to Avoid It by Malcolm Kendrick.
Malcolms book was written for the UK market and I provided a lot more detail on scientific studies. Cholesterol Clarity did also provide lots of scientific information but not is as great detail. I felt it was dumbed down for a less intelligent reader with a lot more anecdotes and sound bites from Dr's rather than in depth information.
That said the message of both books is the same. Overall mortality is virtually unchanged regardless of your Cholesterol level. A sligthly higher chance of heart disease is offset by a lower chance of stroke. High levels can suggest underlying conditions, stress or inflamation. Statins make virtually no impact on overall mortality and often just change the cause of death without resulting in increased lifespan. A life lived on statins is often fraught with numerous harmful side effects.
Many problems can be solved by reducing or eliminating sugar, particularly process sugar and focusing the diet more on healthly fats (basically anything natural and not processed trans fats).
Worth reading but if you are UK based I would advice looking at the back of the book first and converting your Cholesterol readings in to the US measurments so you can more easily follow where you fit within the ranges they refer to many times using these US standards.
My other concern is that many of the additional blood tests they refer to are unlikely to be available on the NHS.
Malcolms book was written for the UK market and I provided a lot more detail on scientific studies. Cholesterol Clarity did also provide lots of scientific information but not is as great detail. I felt it was dumbed down for a less intelligent reader with a lot more anecdotes and sound bites from Dr's rather than in depth information.
That said the message of both books is the same. Overall mortality is virtually unchanged regardless of your Cholesterol level. A sligthly higher chance of heart disease is offset by a lower chance of stroke. High levels can suggest underlying conditions, stress or inflamation. Statins make virtually no impact on overall mortality and often just change the cause of death without resulting in increased lifespan. A life lived on statins is often fraught with numerous harmful side effects.
Many problems can be solved by reducing or eliminating sugar, particularly process sugar and focusing the diet more on healthly fats (basically anything natural and not processed trans fats).
Worth reading but if you are UK based I would advice looking at the back of the book first and converting your Cholesterol readings in to the US measurments so you can more easily follow where you fit within the ranges they refer to many times using these US standards.
My other concern is that many of the additional blood tests they refer to are unlikely to be available on the NHS.
September 30, 2025
This is an easy and informative read that quotes a variety of experts.
November 2, 2015
Probably a 5 star for the impact it makes in educating & empowering people that are new to understanding this subject. Great for beginners. Good reference & additional resources for those of us who are versed in the subject but can always learn more.
June 20, 2022
In spite of the overwhelming evidence of the toxicity of statins presented here, there are still two doctors in this book, defending the use of statins, "in some patients"? What a load of complete crap! Bottom line, people just need to eliminate all sugar, grains, and seed oils to be healthier. Patients need to reduce inflammation! Statins unnaturally lower cholesterol and do nothing to prevent heart disease. How ANY doctor quoted in this book STILL defends them is not logical in the slightest. I am so angry that they were allowed to contribute, much less, remain working physicians. I kept waiting for their reasoning why ANYONE should use statins, but no, there were no reasons. I guess just because they are physicians and need to defend their choices. Nothing in the book defended their position. I am so pissed off the author had to kowtow to this idiocy. My question to Jimmy is why include this nonsense? You ruined the validity of this whole book by playing to all sides.
June 22, 2021
Very informative and useful. Highly recommend reading this book.
February 8, 2017
This is a very readable explanation about how to read your lipid panel. The book asserts that LDL and cholesterol numbers are meaningless in isolation when predicting potential for heart disease. Advanced cholesterol testing is necessary to analyze blood cholesterol levels correctly. cholesterol is very important to your body and low HDL can be worse than high HDL to heart health. Statins are overprescribed because of the overwhelming medical evidence that there is a correlation between hearth health and cholesterol levels. The book advises to look closely at all the numbers and focus more on diet, nutrition and exercise when treating cholesterol. Also, the author advises to look closely at what kind of LDL particles- large or small constitute your total LDL count. Not all doctors will run the tests to perform this analysis. Food is more powerful than statins in the battle for heart health. Triglycerides together with small LDL-P are increased by a high intake of carbohydrates. So Lessening carbohydrate intake could be as effective as statins in lowering bad cholesterol. In fact this book describes in detail how a low carb, high fat diet can actually increase good cholesterol -HDL and decrease triglycerides. When you read your basic cholesterol panel, the most important numbers to look at are HDL-good cholesterol which should bee high, and VDL or triglycerides which should be low. LDL is meaningless unless you know whether the particles are small or large. Not many people understand the complexities of understanding their cholesterol numbers, the book helps decipher the numbers, makes some suggestions a a out diet that counters what your doctor might recommend. The take away is before you decide to take statins, understand what your lipid panel numbers mean by requesting additional testing than the basic lipid panel even if you have to bear the cost of the extra lab tests. Eating well is the best prescription to good health.
October 7, 2013
Moore and Westman tackle everything from the scientific deficiencies with conventional "wisdom" and treatment for heart disease and their historical origins to the gross misunderstandings on what "heart healthy" nutrition means. They also teach you how to analyze your own test results and what the results REALLY mean. Most importantly, the information in this book is ACCESSIBLE to anyone because it presented in a simple, clear, and interesting manner with lots of factual information and talking points to not only inform the reader, but also to arm him/her with the knowledge, science, and medical history to back it up. This book has the potential to save thousands of lives. If you or anyone you love is on statins or has "high" cholesterol, I strongly urge you to read it.
December 17, 2018
Got this through my local library via Interlibrary Loan (ILL)
Total cholesterol level is useless.
When chol is in HDL, it’s good.
When it’s in large buoyant LDL particles, it’s neutral
When it’s in VLDL (TG), it’s bad.
And when it’s in small dense LDL particles, it’s disastrous.
Pg 97
What you see as LDL on your cholesterol test results is LDL-C, a calculated estimate, not a true number.
Pattern A LDL is large fluffy harmless LDL particles
Pattern B is the small, dense and potentially dangerous kind.
So if LDL is high, demand a new test running the particle test size.
There’s only 1 thing that causes small LDL particles & that’s carbs.
Pg 98
There isn’t a drug that lowers TG’s well, just diet.
High TGs trigger the production of the small dense lipoprotein particles that cause atherosclerosis
Pg 104
Best indicator of health is triglyceride to HDL ratio.
This number goes hand in hand with number of small LDL particles.
Optimal ratio is 1.0 or lower.
Preferably, TGs should be around 50.
Best way to get that: cut carbs and increase fat
Pg 108
CRP (C-reactive Protein) should also be low. If CRP is <1.0, then it doesn’t matter what the cholesterol levels are bc no inflammation so no cholesterol being deposited as plaque.
High CRP can be caused from smoking, too much EtOH, trans fats & processed carbs, high blood sugar, chemical exposure, high BP, &/or stress
Pg 114
Reduce your cardio-metabolic risk by decreasing your dose of statins gradually while simultaneously changing diet to improve overall health.
Pg 118
Jupiter study showed the very best marker of cardiovascular risk is CRP. (Not cholesterol)
Pg 119
The patient is always the boss, and the doctor is the employee; you have hired them to consult about your health. But you are the final arbiter when it comes to your health.
Pg 127
Let your doctor do thru all the std treatment protocols they need to do to stay in medical compliance, even if that includes them writing you a script for statins. That doesn’t mean you have to fill it! This keeps your doctor out of trouble for not treating your high cholesterol “properly “, thus protecting them legally if something happens to your heart health.
Pg 128
If you have excess sugar in the blood, then the sugar attaches and attacks the LDL and causes something called glycation damage. Proteins in the blood get glycated by excess sugar; this is strongly related to diabetes. When you have diabetes, you have high sugar in the blood and that sugar attack’s the proteins in the blood one of the things that it attack’s is the LDL. Think of a keyhole gummed up with ice, preventing you from getting into your car. Your body can have the same problem. The LDL is gummed up with sugar and it becomes inefficient in delivering its goods to the tissues, so you need more of it to function properly. When LDL gets gummed up with sugar, it can’t get recycled by the liver. So you get these small dense LDL particles that are basically crud. They’re garbage that can’t be gotten rid of. It gets stuck in this form that your body can’t use. That’s why these macrophages come into the plaque and scavenge - to basically sweep this LDL into the cell, clean it up, and send it back out again in HDL. The macrophages are performing a very heroic activity in taking the small dense LDL out of circulation. The LDL provides a service of delivering cholesterol and fats to the tissues. This leaves it as a small dense LDL particle that then gets transported back to the liver to become refurbished and cleaned up. That process gets stuck because of sugar.
Pg 143
There is a segment of the population that has a mysterious reaction to low-carb high-fat diet: their LDL-C, LDL-P, ApoB and total cholesterol spike dramatically. The reason for now is unknown.
Pg 145
Here’s the key ?: if all your other health markers incl most of your lipid markets are ok & you are eating alow-carb high-fat diet diet, are you at greater risk of heart attack because your LDL-P is high? We don’t know, because the studies haven’t been done.
Pg 146
Watchful waiting rather than treating with a statin is the smart thing to do
Also re-eval thyroid labs
Don’t get chol tests during wt loss. Reach goal weight, wait a month, then test
When the body is using its own fat energy storage for fuel, blood chol levels may shift dramatically.
Pg158
Lack of micronutrients like iodine, selenium, zinc or copper can raise cholesterol
Pg 159
the benefits you receive from statin treatment is trivial
for a 60 y.o. male who had had a heart attack, the change of being alive for another 5 years is about 90%. By taking a statin every day, he increases those odds by only 2%
pg 165
Pharmaceutical industry spokespeople would have us believe that the benefits of taking their drugs are far more dramatic. But they're merely pointing out the relative risks, which show a greater percentage of perceived benefit, not absolute risks, which have a far less significant benefit. "The drug companies tell us that we can lower the risk of a heart attack by 20% with statins because of the 2% different in mortality rates. With a statin, it's 8% and without statin treatment it's 10%. But to sue the change in percentage rather than percentage points is incredibly misleading."
pg 163-4
Statin drugs increase the risk of diabetes by 4%, impotence by 20%, and muscle and joint pain by more than 40%.
pg 164
If you're really worried about your high cholesterol, get a CT heart calcium scan. If you don't have any coronary artery calcium, stop worrying!
Ideal LDL-C ranges
People at very high risk of heart disease: <70
High risk of heart disease: <100
Near ideal: 100-129
borderline risk of heart disease: 130-159
Total cholesterol level is useless.
When chol is in HDL, it’s good.
When it’s in large buoyant LDL particles, it’s neutral
When it’s in VLDL (TG), it’s bad.
And when it’s in small dense LDL particles, it’s disastrous.
Pg 97
What you see as LDL on your cholesterol test results is LDL-C, a calculated estimate, not a true number.
Pattern A LDL is large fluffy harmless LDL particles
Pattern B is the small, dense and potentially dangerous kind.
So if LDL is high, demand a new test running the particle test size.
There’s only 1 thing that causes small LDL particles & that’s carbs.
Pg 98
There isn’t a drug that lowers TG’s well, just diet.
High TGs trigger the production of the small dense lipoprotein particles that cause atherosclerosis
Pg 104
Best indicator of health is triglyceride to HDL ratio.
This number goes hand in hand with number of small LDL particles.
Optimal ratio is 1.0 or lower.
Preferably, TGs should be around 50.
Best way to get that: cut carbs and increase fat
Pg 108
CRP (C-reactive Protein) should also be low. If CRP is <1.0, then it doesn’t matter what the cholesterol levels are bc no inflammation so no cholesterol being deposited as plaque.
High CRP can be caused from smoking, too much EtOH, trans fats & processed carbs, high blood sugar, chemical exposure, high BP, &/or stress
Pg 114
Reduce your cardio-metabolic risk by decreasing your dose of statins gradually while simultaneously changing diet to improve overall health.
Pg 118
Jupiter study showed the very best marker of cardiovascular risk is CRP. (Not cholesterol)
Pg 119
The patient is always the boss, and the doctor is the employee; you have hired them to consult about your health. But you are the final arbiter when it comes to your health.
Pg 127
Let your doctor do thru all the std treatment protocols they need to do to stay in medical compliance, even if that includes them writing you a script for statins. That doesn’t mean you have to fill it! This keeps your doctor out of trouble for not treating your high cholesterol “properly “, thus protecting them legally if something happens to your heart health.
Pg 128
If you have excess sugar in the blood, then the sugar attaches and attacks the LDL and causes something called glycation damage. Proteins in the blood get glycated by excess sugar; this is strongly related to diabetes. When you have diabetes, you have high sugar in the blood and that sugar attack’s the proteins in the blood one of the things that it attack’s is the LDL. Think of a keyhole gummed up with ice, preventing you from getting into your car. Your body can have the same problem. The LDL is gummed up with sugar and it becomes inefficient in delivering its goods to the tissues, so you need more of it to function properly. When LDL gets gummed up with sugar, it can’t get recycled by the liver. So you get these small dense LDL particles that are basically crud. They’re garbage that can’t be gotten rid of. It gets stuck in this form that your body can’t use. That’s why these macrophages come into the plaque and scavenge - to basically sweep this LDL into the cell, clean it up, and send it back out again in HDL. The macrophages are performing a very heroic activity in taking the small dense LDL out of circulation. The LDL provides a service of delivering cholesterol and fats to the tissues. This leaves it as a small dense LDL particle that then gets transported back to the liver to become refurbished and cleaned up. That process gets stuck because of sugar.
Pg 143
There is a segment of the population that has a mysterious reaction to low-carb high-fat diet: their LDL-C, LDL-P, ApoB and total cholesterol spike dramatically. The reason for now is unknown.
Pg 145
Here’s the key ?: if all your other health markers incl most of your lipid markets are ok & you are eating alow-carb high-fat diet diet, are you at greater risk of heart attack because your LDL-P is high? We don’t know, because the studies haven’t been done.
Pg 146
Watchful waiting rather than treating with a statin is the smart thing to do
Also re-eval thyroid labs
Don’t get chol tests during wt loss. Reach goal weight, wait a month, then test
When the body is using its own fat energy storage for fuel, blood chol levels may shift dramatically.
Pg158
Lack of micronutrients like iodine, selenium, zinc or copper can raise cholesterol
Pg 159
the benefits you receive from statin treatment is trivial
for a 60 y.o. male who had had a heart attack, the change of being alive for another 5 years is about 90%. By taking a statin every day, he increases those odds by only 2%
pg 165
Pharmaceutical industry spokespeople would have us believe that the benefits of taking their drugs are far more dramatic. But they're merely pointing out the relative risks, which show a greater percentage of perceived benefit, not absolute risks, which have a far less significant benefit. "The drug companies tell us that we can lower the risk of a heart attack by 20% with statins because of the 2% different in mortality rates. With a statin, it's 8% and without statin treatment it's 10%. But to sue the change in percentage rather than percentage points is incredibly misleading."
pg 163-4
Statin drugs increase the risk of diabetes by 4%, impotence by 20%, and muscle and joint pain by more than 40%.
pg 164
If you're really worried about your high cholesterol, get a CT heart calcium scan. If you don't have any coronary artery calcium, stop worrying!
Ideal LDL-C ranges
People at very high risk of heart disease: <70
High risk of heart disease: <100
Near ideal: 100-129
borderline risk of heart disease: 130-159
June 22, 2025
Forma w jakiej napisana jest ta książka jest bardzo irytująca, ale może w ten sposób są pisane amerykańskie poradniki wszelkiej maści - dużo powtórzeń, dużo żarcików w stylu 'nieśmieszne', rzetelne informacje przeplatane z przykładami zupełnie niewiarygodnymi i chybionymi porównaniami.
Da się wyciągnąć z tego informacje, ale tylko dla osób bardzo cierpliwych i zdeterminowanych.
Da się wyciągnąć z tego informacje, ale tylko dla osób bardzo cierpliwych i zdeterminowanych.
January 9, 2021
Yeah .... I have absolutely no problem (well, not much) with the arguments presented in this book - however - the voice does come across as an over-enthusiastic member of the flat-Earth society ... I don't like that :(
July 23, 2018
The main points are very informative but way too many quotes of experts repeating the same things. It doesn't have a nice flow.
May 24, 2020
This book, along with his Keto Clarity, is a must read for anyone remotely interested in their own health. The information contained in both books have changed my life and the way that I eat and take care of my body. There are many doctors who chime in with their opinions and experience so this is not really the point of view of just one person, you hear similar things across the board. One of the things that I greatly appreciated was that they weren't all saying the exact same thing. They differed slightly in their opinions of how important it is to measure ones cholesterol even though they still strongly believed in the overall message of "you are what you eat." Having read Keto Clarity first, this repeated a lot of the same things, and even within the book itself it was very repetitive. This does help to solidify the information in your mind, but did not help in getting me to finish the book. It took me a year to read because I kept putting it down due to the repetition, but that's not to say that it wasn't important information that was repeated.
January 26, 2023
Moore and Westman, along with a team of doctors, dieticians, and medical researchers, examine (and debunk) the common practice of using a patient’s total cholesterol and LDL (“bad”) cholesterol counts exclusively to measure heart health. In seemingly a majority of cases with high cholesterol readings, the doctor immediately says the patient needs statins to lower cholesterol. In relatively easy-to-understand terms, the team explains the relationships between cholesterol and inflammation, thyroid levels, and a person’s chances of having a heart attack. They also examine the potential risks and benefits of statins (particularly for women), and discuss the lack of benefits to low-fat diets.
As common with this type of book, I give only 3 stars, since I have little or no scientific or medical expertise. That being said, this agrees with other authors I’ve read, and is important reading for anyone taking statins, or evaluating their cholesterol levels and general heart health.
As common with this type of book, I give only 3 stars, since I have little or no scientific or medical expertise. That being said, this agrees with other authors I’ve read, and is important reading for anyone taking statins, or evaluating their cholesterol levels and general heart health.
August 28, 2018
Informative, but where is the actual research data?
While this book contains a lot of information and talks about a lot of studies to back it up, there are no actual references sited. This makes the book interesting, but also useless. If you trust all the information, want to defend your lab results, and justify your refusal to take statins; your physician will require actual data. The data may be out there, but the book does not help you locate the data they talk about. I will need to take a few days on PubMed looking for all these articles so I have actual research data to back my decision. Without that data, I will be seen as a non-compliant patient who follows whimsical trends which are life threatening as opposed to an intelligent and well educated patient who is making a thoughtful and rational decision about my health care.
While this book contains a lot of information and talks about a lot of studies to back it up, there are no actual references sited. This makes the book interesting, but also useless. If you trust all the information, want to defend your lab results, and justify your refusal to take statins; your physician will require actual data. The data may be out there, but the book does not help you locate the data they talk about. I will need to take a few days on PubMed looking for all these articles so I have actual research data to back my decision. Without that data, I will be seen as a non-compliant patient who follows whimsical trends which are life threatening as opposed to an intelligent and well educated patient who is making a thoughtful and rational decision about my health care.
January 31, 2020
I borrowed his other book Keto Clarity from my daughter. I was considering trying the Keto diet but I'm a sceptic at heart. Reading the book struck some common sense cords within me. Nine months later I had lost 70 pounds and did it without being hungry. That built some credibility for this author. At my annual physical my total cholesterol was up over 200. My doctor was preparing a prescription for a statin but I had had a bad side effect with statin a few years ago and stopped taking it. I got a copy of my blood work and bought the book. Turns out my triglycerides had dropped in half (71 from 158) and my HDL was up from 40 to 57. Based on this book I think I've made progress. I'm still monitoring but will be taking a more detailed lab test.
If you are on a statin for high cholesterol, you owe it to yourself to read this book and consider the options.
If you are on a statin for high cholesterol, you owe it to yourself to read this book and consider the options.
May 9, 2021
An easy to understand overview of cholesterol testing and treatment approaches. The author is not a doctor, but is someone who went through a personal health transformation and based on his experience began to research cholesterol more and realized how wrong current guidelines are. Respected experts in a field are quoted throughout the book in support of the author's stance.
But I was very disappointed that there was no references section: I would have liked a list of the papers they based their opinions on.
But I was very disappointed that there was no references section: I would have liked a list of the papers they based their opinions on.
July 19, 2021
Very, very, very repetitive. I have to stop reading books by podcasters. This reads like an infomercial on a five-minute loop. You can hear the guy's sweater dying inside. We get it: he doesn't like doctors and thinks they're all on Big Pharmas payroll. And yet half of every page has a bubble from a doctor/podcast guest he does like. Billy Mays is spinning in his grave and not just from all the coke. BTW, dude spends the whole book saying LDL is good. Doesn't define what LDL is until chapter 19.
March 9, 2017
This book supports the ketogenic diet with solid research in most cases. Overweight is caused by too mulch insulin from too many carbs in most people. Heart disease is not caused by cholesterol but by inflammation of the blood vessels. Cholesterol is part of the cure, and is misunderstood as the cause. Reducing the inflammation is best done with low carbohydrate and no sugar diets. This is an oversimplification.
November 16, 2017
A very informative book about cholesterol. However, it is very focused on western way of life. Vegiterian people do not have many options to have animal fat, other than cottage cheese etc. Also, I believe it is better to follow your staple diet for which your body is used to rather than abruptly changing the diet to control some numbers. Different cultures have different numbers. Regular exercise and stress free lifestyle is better than diet.
September 28, 2018
I learned a lot from this book. I used to hate studying cholesterol, but now that there has been more research it's a lot more interesting. This is a very straightforward walkthrough on interpreting cholesterol results.
There are a few concepts discussed that I don't agree with. I'm not so sure about the supplements it discusses some of that seems 'Quacky'. I do like the discussion of diet and importance of cholesterol in the body functions.
There are a few concepts discussed that I don't agree with. I'm not so sure about the supplements it discusses some of that seems 'Quacky'. I do like the discussion of diet and importance of cholesterol in the body functions.
August 25, 2017
Despite the author's sensationalism and the repetition, this was a very interesting read. It should be clear to everyone that whatever the world is doing with regards to nutrition, somewhere we've gone horribly wrong and the obesity, diabetes, heart disease epidemic is just snowballing. This book has definitely got me thinking!
December 31, 2017
A book that clarifies a lot and will definitely help anyone to understand issues involving cholesterol that may be of interest. It will also help you learn more about nutrition and how to be a better spokesperson for yourself when meeting with you doctor. You may find out that you know more than they do after reading this book. Easy to read and clear in its message and information.
February 15, 2018
Eye Opening and Life Changing
I feel like I have been lied to for years regarding my health and how to help myself. I am so happy to know the truth! I will no longer just blindly go along with what my Dr says but I will research to make sure what I am told is truth. It is time to take responsibility for my own health and do my part.
I feel like I have been lied to for years regarding my health and how to help myself. I am so happy to know the truth! I will no longer just blindly go along with what my Dr says but I will research to make sure what I am told is truth. It is time to take responsibility for my own health and do my part.
December 21, 2023
The book was highly repetitive and written in a very salesman-like manner. The foregone conclusion of the book regarding perverse incentives present with medical economics is sensible, but the author would have been more believable writing in a more investigative tone and presenting more facts vs. comical anecdotes.
July 3, 2024
It repetes the same info over and over. It does give some insight into what the different test numbers mean, but they pretty much say ignore them and eat low carb.
I think this would have been a much better information resource if it had provided references to some of the studies instead of just saying many studies were done. Show me the proof.
I think this would have been a much better information resource if it had provided references to some of the studies instead of just saying many studies were done. Show me the proof.
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