The blood test from Apr 06 was for an occupational physical, which I passed, and didn't think much about my numbers. At the time I was pretty ignorant about cholesterol, trigs, etc. I have always been in pretty good shape, I carry a good amount of muscle on my frame, but I knew I was a little overweight last year. I was in the doctor's office for a routine appointment in Oct 06 and I showed him these results. After looking at them for 30 seconds he told me that I had all the symptoms of metabolic syndrome and needed to go on a combination of several drugs, including Lipitor, otherwise I would soon DIE. (he didn't use those exact words, but the meaning was there.) I was very shocked at this and told him I wanted to get retested, since I probably did not properly fast before the Apr 06 test, and I also probably had alcohol within a few days of the blood test. Also, when the nurse took my blood pressure it was 126/82, but when he took it it was 135/95 and 130/90. He finally relented to a retest, but he wanted me to go on a low dose diuretic immediately (12.5 mg HCTZ). I resolved to do some lifestyle changes - eat better, drink less alcohol, and exercise more.
I was retested in Dec 06, those results are above. I was happy that the results were improved, but this doctor still wanted me to go on all of the drugs including a statin. I told him that I had only done some lifestyle changes for about 6 weeks, and I felt that I should give it more time before starting a lifetime of taking drugs. He did not seem receptive at all to lifestyle changes, just kept talking about metabolic syndrome since my HDL was low and trigs were high. I told him I was going to seek a 2nd opinion because I did not feel comfortable yet with going on drugs. He said that another doctor would tell me the same thing. I then spoke to another doctor in the office, he told me that my results were not that bad, and that I should have another test in a few months to see how the lifestyle changes helped my results.
In the past 6 months I have lost almost 20 lbs, I eat better and drink less alcohol. I take a daily multivitamin and 2 fish oil tables daily. I also try to use a half teaspoon of cinnamon at least a few days per week. I bought a home blood pressure tester and my average BP in the last 40 days is about 127/77. When I got my new results back the other day, the nurse called and only said that the doctor said that all my results came back "good". I am dealing with the new doctor now because the old doctor is, in my view, a pompous ***.
It appears to me that my new results are very good, but there are still some things that concern me. My HDL did not rise very much even though I have been taking fish oil and exercising more, adn it is still under 40. My glucose is still only a few points away from "pre-diabetes". Could my 67 point drop in total cholesterol be mostly due to my great drop in trigs? What is the ideal chol/HDL ratio?
I have posted on this board before and got some great feedback, especially from Lenin and HubbleRules among others. I'd love to know what you think about this. Should I consider asking for a prescription quality fish oil tablet? And what about niacin? I think I read that nicotinic acid is the best kind of niacin for raising HDL, and the non-flushing niacin and the time-release niacin are not as effective on HDL. Also, the time release niacin may cause liver problems. For now, my plan is to keep doing what I am doing and try to get my weight down to 160. Thanks for your input. Am I too worried about this?
You might want to read about "USDA and cinnamon for blood sugar", it should help in your case. If you really think you have metabolic X syndrome, you should also check into low INTRACELLULAR magnesium. Not just serum magnesium, it must be intracellular. Dr. Mildred Sellig is an excellent source for this. Dr. Seelig ws the world's leading magnesium specialist, (Emory University, and U. of N. Carolina, Chapel Hill).
