Medicine Information Article:

CRP And Your Heart

Monitoring your CRP level is vitally important because it is one of the best indicators of heart disease. C-Reactive Protein has proven to be one of the best indicators of looming Heart disease.

Find out why high cholesterol alone is NOT responsible for heart disease. And you will find out how to keep your CRP Level in the normal range.

Because your body produces C-Reactive Protein as part of your body's defense - like when you are injured, it signals your immune system for help. Your immune system sends out white blood cells and inflammatory molecules (including C-Reactive Protein) to the injured area.

This defensive system causes inflammation which is damaging to blood vessels and leads to heart disease. Because this is an continuous process, not like an ankle injury which heals and then inflammation goes away.

Elevated C-Reactive Protein levels are an early indication of inflammation in the body. When there is inflammation in the body, there is usually a problem. Realize this is why C-Reactive Protein is a great indicator.

Naturally you can easily understand that C-Reactive Protein is a better indicator of heart disease than cholesterol. A huge study on CRP backs this up.

The New England Journal of Medicine published A report where nearly 28,000 people participated in a study of CRP. Researchers in the study used LDL cholesterol and CRP to predict heart attacks and stroke.

What the researchers found was that CRP was a better predictor of cardiac events than LDL cholesterol -1

So - what can you do to keep your C-Reactive Protein level low? In a word, exercise. Activity is the best way to keep CRP levels low. Just taking a walk is a good way to get your activity level up.

There are also important nutrients to help limit the damage from the inflammation.

Here are several nutrients you have heard of:

Vitamin C

Vitamin E

And Folic Acid - protects the blood vessels.

Two others you may not have heard as much about:

Taurine - is an amino acid-like compound and a component of bile acids, which are used to help absorb fats and fat- soluble vitamins. It is found in meat and fish.

L-arginine - A naturally occurring amino acid found in food proteins that the body uses to make Nitric Oxide.

You can easily get plenty of these nutrients through food and supplements combined.

Talk to your doctor about a simple test for CRP levels, it is like a blood test. It is best to keep your levels under 5 mg per liter, preferably 3 mg per liter.

1 - Ridker P., et al. Comparison of C-reactive protein and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels in the prediction of first cardiovascular events. NEJM 2002 Nov 14; 347(20): 1557-1565

Please feel free to use this article in your newsletter or on your website(with resource box included and use an active link).

This article may not be used in any e-mail promotions that do not conform with federal law.

If you use this article, please send a brief message to let me know where it appeared: mailto:leeman@lc-nutrition.com

About The Author

Lee Cummings has been helping people solve problems and feel better with proven nutrition for over 4 years. Lee publishes the montly LC Nutrition newsletter. For a Fr^ee Report - mailto:report@lc-nutrition.com Discover proven nutrition information visit: http://www.LC-Nutrition.com

Raw Food For Better Health

A Good Raw Diet for Your Health - These days, we're seeing more and more instances of a variety of autoimmune disorders. Diseases like MS, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, and a host of others seem to be on the rise. Some say that it's merely due to better diagnostic tools; and others say that it's environmental factors: pollution and the foods we eat that are leading to more people being hit by these maladies.

The Undiscovered Secret For Safer Surgery

Surgery carries undeniable risks with it, no doubt about it. But the dangers of anesthesia, of cutting, drilling, and using lasers is nearly always overshadowed by the overwhelming benefits of the surgery. What if there were a simple, safe way to avoid many of these pitfalls by significantly decreasing the amount of anesthesia a patient needs in order to stay safe anesthetized? Well, there is!

Prescription Drugs Safety Tips

While prescription drugs are very effective treatments for many diseases, it's important to know that no drug, prescription or over-the-counter, is completely safe. While drugs are crucial for controlling or curing illness, many have significant side effects. Learn basic tips to help reduce potential risks and get the most benefit from a drug.

Personalized Medicine - The New Era, Genetic Assessments and You

This article briefly touches upon the fact that personalized medicine has always been a reality for health care practioners. In this day and age, knowledge of the human genome, genetics, DNA, and genetic propensities for illness has opened up a new door regarding personalized medicine and nutrition.

Which Drug is Most Frequently Implicated in Childhood Colitis?

Ulcerative colitis usually does not affect the full thickness of the wall of the large intestine and rarely affects the small intestine. I have seen the info on colitis just would like to see if there is anything else that can be done. The cause of ulcerative colitis is unknown, and currently there is no cure, except through surgical removal of the colon.