Eliminating fatty foods healthy habit

Dear Dr. Gott: In a recent column, you referred to the nonbenefit of regularly eating oatmeal. Let me relate my own experience.

I will be 67 years old this summer and consider myself to be in excellent physical condition. I weigh about 200 pounds. I jog and walk 4-plus miles per day, carry a 190 average in a weekly bowling league and played organized basketball until the year I turned 55. I have never taken prescription medicine, with the exception of that referred to below and maybe a half a dozen pills per year for an allergy when it flares up.

I was a very heavy smoker (three-plus packs a day) for more than 35 years until the doctor told me in 1982 that I could probably live forever if I gave up smoking, but he would guarantee those “cancer sticks” would kill me if I didn’t.

In the course of a routine physical at age 50, the doctor shared with me that my cholesterol level was above 240, primarily because of elevated “bad” cholesterol. He said I could increase my activity level (at that time I was running eight miles per day on days that I did not play basketball); lose weight (I weighed less than 185); or take some medicine. He prescribed Mevacor.

I took the medicine for three or four days and did not feel good about the effect it was having on me, so I stopped and decided to try an alternate solution. I read of a number of things that were reported to lower cholesterol, so decided to give them a try. I started eating a bowl of “old fashioned” oatmeal each morning and at least one ruby-red grapefruit per week; took two lecithin capsules and one garlic tablet per day; and stopped eating red meat. Almost overnight, my cholesterol level dropped below 200 and has now stabilized at approximately 190.

I continue to eat oatmeal each morning, substituting soymilk and grapes for regular milk and sugar. I eat quite a bit of chicken and turkey and some fish, but avoid red meat completely.

With the exception of a couple of episodes with allergy and two occasions when I have been treated for minor facial pre-cancer, I am completely free of medical problems.

Dear Reader: Although your daily oatmeal appears to have resulted in extraordinary benefits, I suspect that your success in lowering your cholesterol is more related to the other changes you have made in your diet, such as having eliminated many sources of dietary cholesterol.

I would also like to add that the daily use of omega 3 fish oil capsules has shown great promise in helping reduce high serum cholesterol.

To give you related information, I am sending you a copy of my Health Report “Understanding Cholesterol.” Other readers who would like a copy should send a long, self-addressed, stamped envelope and $2 to Newsletter, P.O. Box 167, Wickliffe, OH 44092. Be sure to mention the title.