Customer Reviews

50 Ways to Lower Cholesterol

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In my last physical exam, my blood tests showed that I have high cholesterol for the first time in my life. I wanted to learn about high cholesterol before my appointment with my doctor to discuss treatment. I read several books on the subject and found this one to be the best! Dr McGowan explained what cholesterol is in terms I could actually understand. Besides that, she covers all areas that affect your cholesterol level with suggestions on how to lower the bad cholesterol and raise the good cholesterol. Specific topics covered include: Diet, Supplements, Exercise, Quit Smoking, and Medications. After reading and studying this book, I feel ready to discuss my options intelligently with my doctor. I wish there were more practical and down-to-earth books on this subject....like this one. Most books about cholesterol read like they are written for doctors and scientists instead of the common people like me.

Mary McGowan,M.D., well known and highly respected expert on the treatment of lipids, previously wrote an extremely helpful book titled: "Heartfitness for Life".(Read the customer reviews for that book!). Among the many areas she covers are treatment for homocysteine, for which many physicians don't bother to test, and for LPa,which is "badder" than the "bad" cholesterol,LDL. Too many physicians have no idea what LPa is, and some actually argue against testing for it, as they have no idea how to treat it. In this her latest book, she adds additional information on lowering LPa. The book is full of new, clearly explained practical information. I can't recommend it too highly, for anyone, beginner or long time learner having concerns about their lipid status. It should be required reading for cardiologists, internists, and family physicians, who could use this book as a resource for their patients, and in many cases for themselves.

I thought I knew how to handle high cholesterol, but this book taught me stuff I didn't know I didn't know. Besides a good treatment on self-help options, it has a nice overview of different cholesterol-lowering drugs that gives me the language to be able to discuss these issues intelligently with my doctor. She writes in a friendly, accessible style but still goes into fairly good detail about specific items that are easy to skip if they don't pertain. (For example, I thought her advice on how to handle a cigarette addiction was great, but I don't smoke.)

A wonderfully down to Earth and sensible book. Lots of tips for everyday things you can easily do. Very helpful and useful! I highly recommned this book to everyone.

This reviewer read "50 Ways" after lowering his cholesterol via individual-and expensive(!)nutritional counseling. The advice on the printed page herein is highly similar to what I received. "50 Ways" should be just as effective at a much more user- friendly price tag. The 50 ways herein are 50 chapters: Some will be more applicable than others but the text is loaded with helpful hints on diet, portion control- that's portion control! - exercise, supplements and the thorny issue of prescription drugs. This reviewer read those particular chapters trepidation because he is trying to avoid the subject but authors McGowan and Chopra provide lots of useful and fathomable information. "50 Ways" does not mention two subjects of possible interest to cholesterol fellow travelers: One is egg whites and their possible role in an improved diet. The other is that the Benocal folks now have a chewable product to match their spread. "50 Ways" is, in the final analysis, a self help book. And as with any self-help product, one cannot read it once and file it on a shelf. Whether one is referring to "The Power of Positive Thinking" or "The Good Mood Diet", works like these should be kept handy for future reference. Those who do should be very happy with their copy of "50 Ways".

This book is best for someone who is new to physical fitness and nutrition, particularly someone who needs to lose weight. For those who know basic health guidelines, exercise, and eat healthy, much of the material presented was common knowledge.

For example, multiple chapters explain how to exercise, including target heart rates and the importance of warming up and cooling down. If I had wanted a book on how to exercise, I would have bought a book on how to exercise. The book also describes tips for healthy eating such as not snacking too much, avoiding eating at restaurants (watch out for that cheese!), eating a variety of vegetables -- all of which is common knowledge. However, the book doesn't have a comprehensive list of the best foods to eat to improve cholesterol levels. Which fish are best for omega 3 acids? Do the combinations of omega 3, 6, and 9 acids matter? Which nuts are best? These questions were not addressed at all.

Even more concerning were factual errors. In one instance, the author recommends exercise in order to "turn fat into muscle." As is now well known, it's impossible to turn fat into muscle (rather, one loses fat and builds muscle). I can't imagine the author actually thinks one can turn fat into muscle, which only reinforces my belief that this book is a basic-level read that glosses over the details.

The book is structured into 50 chapters, often a handful of pages long, which are written to be read individually. Some of the chapters are repetitive as a result.

The chapters on supplements and medications are standouts (perhaps because I knew nothing about those subjects going in). The chapters quote studies and may b more nuanced. However, given my experience with the rest of the book, I'm not confident that these chapters represent the cutting edge (even as of 2002) and will have to buy another book on cholesterol to be satisfied.

I was hoping for a discussion of specific foods that are good and foods to avoid. There was a list of foods with high soluble fiber, but that's the bulk of it. Recommendations of foods to eat (walnuts, fibrous foods, shrimp) are mixed throughout the book, presented simplistically, and few studies or details are presented. While I did learn some things, the nutrition chapters were less than I expected. I won't be able to easily reference this book when deciding what to cook at home.

I'm not a smoker so I breezed through the chapters on smoking. In brief, the first chapter (two pages on my Kindle) describes the cholesterol impacts of smoking, and the next 20 pages described how to quite smoking. Actually, this is fairly representative of how the book works -- a little information on cholesterol and a lot of life advice. I imagine if I were a smoker, I'd want 20 pages on the cholesterol impact of smoking and would buy a separate book on how to quit.

The sections on medications were likely useful in their time, but now are seriously outdated. Each major drug receives two to five pages (on my Kindle) with an overview, side effects, instructions for use, precautions, and other notes. This section is a good start for someone considering which prescription medicine is the best fit; however the information is now seven years old.

For someone who wasn't already well-versed in the basics of being healthy, this could be an essential book. However, for someone who already eats healthy and doesn't have any weight loss or body composition issues, the book is lacking. The sections on medications are useful but outdated. Retrospectively, I would have been better off to spend time searching the internet instead of making this purchase.

If you have any recommendations for great Cholesterol books, I'd love to hear them in the comments!

Good book with many tables and figures if you are looking for that. Order at least 2 different books to see things from all angles

This book by Dr. MacGowan is informative, easy to understand and contains lots of useful ideas to help lower cholesterol. She writes so that most people will be able to understand and reap the benefits of knowing there are more ways to lower cholesterol than by taking statins, such as natural foods and supplements. I enjoyed the book very much.

I am 29 years old and found out I have high cholesterol. It was very scary for me and I wasn't sure of what I was dealing with. This book is great. It not only helped me understand what was wrong it also made me feel good with great ideas on how to make it better, I truly liked this book and am very thankful for it.

This book provides a fairly decent introduction to the topic but is, as of 2011, dated in terms of quite a bit of its research. For example, the author praises the cholestoral reducing power of walnuts over almonds. ALthough research "showed" this to be the case as of the late 1990s, today research shows the opposite to be the case. The author also provides no discusssion whatsoever of the importance of stress and sleep in the cholestoral equation. Again, this most likely to the fact that when the book was published these were considered not very important. More recent research indicates that they are of greater importance to cholestoral control.

The book itself has chapters on the causes of high cholesteroal , foods that should be taken (albeit this chapter is far too short considering its importance), an overview of the major anti-cholestoral drugs, excercise and a chapter on quitting smoking. All and all not a bad introduction though with the problems cited above. For those who are in need of a more serious and less dated discussion this reviewer recommends, however, purchasing something that is more up to date. A good example of a more updated book would be Janet Brill's "Cholesterol Down: Ten Simple Steps to Lower Your Cholesterol in Four Weeks--Without Prescription Drugs".