Stanley Krippner
Eat your way to a healthier heart!
Heart disease is the number one killer in America, and the widespread belief is that it is caused by a diet high in fat and cholesterol. Why do many heart attack victims have "normal" cholesterol levels? Why do the French, who love foie gras and red wine, rarely develop heart disease? How is it that the native people of Greenland and the Masai of Africa, whose diets consists largely of animal fat, have almost no heart disease?
For eighty-five years, the cholesterol theory of heart disease reigned supreme. But it has never been scientifically proven that fats and cholesterol cause arteriosclerosis or that lowering the amount of fat and cholesterol in our diets will reduce our risk of developing heart disease.
In this groundbreaking book, Dr. Kilmer McCully explains what is really behind the epidemic of heart disease. The Harvard-trained physician and researcher reveals how the vitamin B deficiency in our Western diet has produced harmful blood levels of homocysteine, an amino acid produced in the body. Homocysteine damages the arteries, leaving them susceptible to cholesterol and fat deposits. For many years clogged arteries have been inaccurately viewed as the cause, rather than the symptom , of heart disease. Now McCully shows you how to cut your risk of heart disease by controlling the real culprit, homocysteine. Considered one of the most significant medical breakthroughs in recent years, McCully's findings have been validated by numerous large-scale studies.
The Heart Revolution:
challenged the long-held assumptions that lowering cholesterol is the key to preventing heart disease
explains how eating vitamin B-rich food can control homocysteine levels
lays pout a plan with menus for putting more B vitamins in our diet
discusses how food processing and additives compromise our health
exposes the politics within the medical community and the pharmaceutical industry
explains how costly cholesterol-lowering medicines can actually harm our health
In the 1970s, pharmaceutical houses were making huge profits on cholesterol-lowering drugs. When McCully dared to challenge the prevailing view that cholesterol caused heart disease, he was castigated by his peers. Thirty years later he has received international recognition for the very same work. The Heart Revolution is more than a revolutionary program for disease prevention, it is also an intriguing tale of medical discovery.
Kilmer McCully
From a barnesandnoble.com e-nnouncement
Good news for Americans trying to cut their risk of
heart disease but tired of rigid fat-free dietary
regimens! Cholesterol and clogged arteries are NOT the
culprits of heart disease, but rather the symptoms. The
real culprit is homocysteine -- an amino acid that builds
up in the body due to a nutritional deficiency of vitamins
B6, folic acid, and B12, the very nutrients lacking in
the classic Western diet. This controversial link between
homocysteine and heart disease was first proposed by a
Harvard-trained physician, Dr. Kilmer McCully, over 30
years ago, but has only recently been corroborated by
large scale studies. Dr. McCully's breakthrough book
THE HEART REVOLUTION: THE VITAMIN B BREAKTHROUGH THAT
LOWERS HOMOCYSTEINE LEVELS, CUTS YOUR RISK OF HEART
DISEASE, AND PROTECTS YOUR HEALTH should change the
course of heart disease in this country and help Americans
cut their risk of heart attacks without dangerous
cholesterol-lowering drugs. Read an exclusive essay
written for barnesandnoble.com by Dr. McCully below.
The Heart Revolution by Dr. Kilmer McCully
Thirty years ago, I discovered that cholesterol and clogged
arteries are not the culprits but rather the symptoms of
heart disease, the No. 1 killer of people in this country.
But powerful pharmaceutical houses, making huge profits
on cholesterol-lowering drugs, scorned my theories and
forced me out of my research positions at Harvard and Massachusetts
General Hospital.
Castigated by my peers but still believing in my work, I
began the long fight to prove my theories, and my findings
have recently been corroborated by large-scale studies
published in the New England Journal of Medicine and
other publications. In my new book, THE HEART REVOLUTION:
THE B VITAMIN BREAKTHROUGH THAT LOWERS HOMOCYSTEINE LEVELS, CUTS YOUR
RISK OF HEART DISEASE, AND PROTECTS YOUR HEALTH, I share
everything I've learned about homocysteine, how dangerous
levels of homocysteine can be lowered simply by making
minor modifications in your diet.
Most people who get heart disease have normal cholesterol
levels in their blood. Even if your cholesterol goes down,
your homocysteine may be high, meaning that your are still
at risk. It's a matter of life and death that we control
the level of homocysteine in our blood.
The link between homocysteine -- an amino acid that
accumulates in the blood -- and heart disease was proposed
by me in 1968, and now I've synthesize my findings for you,
explaining the science behind my theories and laying out
a safe and effective plan that shows you how to:
* Cut your risk of heart attack -- without -- dangerous
cholesterol-lowering drugs
* Stop arteriosclerosis in its tracks -- and perhaps
reverse moderate heart disease
* Add B vitamins to your diet, simply and deliciously,
thereby lowering homocysteine levels
To keep homocysteine levels down, regardless of age or
gender, you should:
* Eat more fresh vegetables and fruits daily to get 400
micrograms of folic acid, 3 milligrams of B6, and other
beneficial nutrients
* Avoid canned or irradiated vegetables
* Steam fresh vegetables with a minimum amount of water
* Eat steel-cut oatmeal, whole-wheat cereal, brown rice,
and root vegetables
* Eliminate white flour, white rice, and refined sugar
* Eat one to two servings of fresh fish, meat or eggs
per day
* A couple of times a month, have liver or pate de foie
gras -- rich sources of Vitamins B6, B12, and folic acid
* Consume 30 percent of calories in the form of beneficial
fats to get the necessary fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E,
and K.
* Eliminate processed and packaged foods that contain
powdered eggs, powdered milk, and partially hydrogenated oils.
Homocysteine was called one of the top-ten most important
news stories of 1998 by Journal Watch, a publication of
The New England Journal of Medicine, and THE HEART
REVOLUTION provides you with the lowdown on it and a
hands-on, easy-to-follow dietary program that addresses
not only the foods we eat but also additives, contaminants,
and preservatives and their relationship to homocysteine
build-up and heart disease. I show why we don't get enough
of the nutrients we need, and also challenge the proponents
of the food pyramid, food manufacturers, food processors,
and drug companies. Did you know that bagels are not
healthy? Because they are made with refined flour, they
provide none of the essential nutrients you need to be
healthy. And vegetables that have been canned have lost
up to 80 percent of their health benefits! When you go out
to dinner and eat the bread in the bread basket with no
butter and have pasta and then finish with the angel food
cake, you feel pretty good about yourself for eating well
and not indulging in fattier, less healthy foods. But the
food you ate has little to no health benefit because all
of the nutrients have been refined away from the white
bread, the plain pasta, and the cake made from a box
mix.
By reexamining the cholesterol hypothesis as myth, THE
HEART REVOLUTION presents a new way of looking at our
diets and provides a new understanding of the underlying
cause of heart disease and other degenerative diseases
associated with aging.