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From:	Jon (76.21.5.29)
Subject:	_What_ Sound Dietary Plan?
Date:	March 20, 2009 at 11:59 am PST

In Reply to: INCREASED CORONARY CALCIUM posted by PAUL on January 13, 2009 at 2:07 pm:

Hi Paul,

> I take all my meds, follow sound dietary plans, exercise an hour a day, but I still have built up excessive calcified
plaque.

DIETARY PLAN

Q. _What_ sound dietary plans? '_Sound_' in whose mind?

Some people will only do a Pritiken-style program, but do not restrict themselves at all - with 'a little' of each food
they like. It did work for Pritiken, but in general it is risky; this 'little bit' often becomes this 'big bit'.

Some cardiologists recommended the South Beach diet - kick them for me.

Some people believe that if the AMA has a cardiac dietary plan it must be safe. - A very likely _fatal_ error
(eventually).

ESSELSTYN

There is only _one_ diet that guarantees "heart attack-proof in three weeks" and zero 'cardiac events' for compliant
patients in twenty years of monitoring. And that is Dr. Caldwell Esslelstyn - Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease. A
variation of Ornish and Dr. John McDougall's plans.

Unless you are following that diet, I'd say that you are right to be concerned. Intuition can be a useful guide. If not
the final arbiter of our life's path.

CALCIUM SCORE

Q. How do you know your calcium score is increasing?

The only way I knew to get a calcium score was the non-approved scanner test. Which may or may not be indicative
of anything. And if one is seeing a cardiologist why is one using such a test? As I understand it, if one follows
Esselstyn one doesn't need to worry about any other tests.

Dr. John McDougall in The McDougall Program for a Healthy Heart is very dubious over cardiology tests because of
where they lead. If you are following a plant based diet, but a negative test result will lead to bypass, did that really
help you. Particularly if you will _not_ have a bypass, because of unacknowledged dire side-effects? etc etc.

He covers each test very well.

HOMO SAPIENS

But finally, there is no one answer for everybody.

John McDougall wrote that he discovered that 20% of his patients would do the right thing and were generally
successful in other areas of their lives.

40% needed a shock -- possibly a very serious medical problem -- before they would change.

The final 40% were hopeless. They would not change. "And they often exhibited destructive behaviour in other areas
of their lives".

There you have it -- homo sapiens -- no 'one size fits all'.

CARDIOLOGISTS

Hope that you are not relying on them for a sound dietary plan. They often have less than three hours of nutrition
education in their entire medical training. See South Beach remark above. Further, if you believe Dr. John McDougall,
they can be seriously detrimental to your health.

Have said which, I know a man who was _very_ glad to have a cardiologist's help. He arrived for the Cath Lab
'shriven of his sins', got a coat-hanger shoved up his leg which he felt in his heart, and was told "we can fix this by
diet and exercise". After which he wondered if that procedure was necessary. A procedure with a 1% mortality --
Russian roulette with one bullet and a hundred chambers. You still don't want to do it every year -- and you may
never want to do it -- up to 80% of angiograms are unnecessary Dr. John McDougall reports, from studies.

"Gee, thanks Doc".

But he is now an Esselstyn 'true believer'. One of McDougall's 40% who needed a severe shock? I should say so. Was
it therefore a 'useful' test?

"Some fools say that they learn from experience. I prefer to learn from the experience of others". -- Count Otto von
Biskmarck. German Chancellor.

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