The raison d'etre of this website is to provide you with hard scientific information which may help you make informed decisions in your quest for health (so far I have blogged concise summaries of over 1,500 scientific studies and have had three books published).

My research is mainly focused on the effects of cholesterol, saturated fat and statin drugs on health. If you know anyone who is worried about their cholesterol levels and heart disease, or has been told to take statin drugs you could send them a link to this website, and to my statin or cholesterol or heart disease books.

David Evans

Independent Health Researcher

Tuesday, 6 April 2010

Low cholesterol as risk factor for mortality in elderly women

This paper was published in the Lancet 1989 Apr 22;1(8643):868-70

Study title and authors:
Cholesterol as risk factor for mortality in elderly women.
Forette B, Tortrat D, Wolmark Y.
Centre Claude Bernard de Gérontologie, Hôpital Sainte Périne, Paris, France.

The paper can be found online at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2564950

This five year study investigated the association between cholesterol levels and death rates in 92 women, average age 82 years old.

The study found:
(a) Those women with cholesterol levels of 4.0 mmol/l (154 mg/dL) had a 420% increased risk of death compared with those women with cholesterol levels of 7.0 mmol/l (270 mg/dL).
(b) Those women with cholesterol levels of 4.0 mmol/l (154 mg/dL) had a 340% increased risk of death compared with those women with cholesterol levels of 8.8 mmol/l (340 mg/dL).

This paper reports, the lower your cholesterol - the earlier you die. Even with very high cholesterol you would live longer than someone with low cholesterol.