What tests are MORE important than cholesterol?

In the conventional practice of early heart disease prevention, cholesterol testing takes center stage. Rarely does it go any further, aside from questions about family history and obvious sources of modifiable risk such as smoking and sedentary lifestyle. So standard practice is to usually look at your LDL cholesterol, the value that is calculated, not measured, then–almost without fail–prescribe a statin drug. While there are indeed useful values in the standard cholesterol panel–HDL cholesterol and triglycerides–they are typically ignored or prompt no specific action. But a genuine effort at heart disease prevention should go farther than an assessment of calculated LDL cholesterol, as there are many ways that humans develop coronary atherosclerosis. Among the tests to consider in order to craft a truly effect heart disease prevention program are: –Lipoprotein testing–Rather than using the amount of cholesterol in the various fractions of blood as a crude surrogate for lipoproteins in the bloodstream, why not measure lipoproteins themselves? These techniques have been around for over 20 years, but are simply not part of standard practice. Lipoprotein testing especially allows you to understand what proportion of LDL particles are the truly unhealthy small LDL particles (that are oxidation- and glycation-prone). It also identifies whether or not you have lipoprotein(a), the heritable factor that confers superior survival capacity in a ...
Source: Track Your Plaque Blog - Category: Cardiology Authors: Tags: Lipoprotein testing Omega-3 fatty acids Omega-3 index Thyroid health vitamin D Source Type: blogs