I started writing this weeks’ blog post about a recent article I saw in the online magazine Vox regarding the safety and benefits of statins (the most commonly used type of medication for cholesterol lowering). However, once I started writing I realized that I needed to make a major digression to explain the concept of “Number Needed to Treat”, which in turn doesn’t fully make sense until one understands the concepts of relative versus absolute risk. So I will instead make this weeks’ entry another in my series on how to read and interpret the medical literature and defer my thoughts on the Vox article to a future post.
Crohn’s disease, in case you aren’t familiar, is a type of “Inflammatory bowel disease,” in which an autoimmune process causes severe inflammation throughout the digestive tract, leading to abdominal pain, bloody stools, malabsorption of nutrients, and other serious and sometimes life-threatening complications. Like many autoimmune diseases, it has become more common over the past few decades, which strongly suggests (since our genetics have not, as a species, changed during that same time period) that environmental triggers such as pollutants, changes to our gut microbiome, stress, and poor diet likely play a role in its development.
This new study, conducted by a group of doctors in Canada, bolsters this idea. After all, if changes in the way we live can cause Crohn’s disease, then it follows that changes in the way we live should also help to alleviate it.
I have previously posted on this topic several times over the past few years – you can read my prior posts by clicking here, here, and here. Having mentioned his film and the screening it will be having in the area (April 13th at the AMC 11 in Dartmouth – click here if you’d like to reserve tickets), I’d like now to come back to this research and discuss my latest thoughts on it.
I’m pleased to announce that on April 13th, at the AMC Dartmouth Mall 11 theater (Dartmouth Massachusetts, that is), there will be a screening of the new documentary, “The Cholesterol Code.” Tickets are on sale now for the price of $22, and can be purchased by clicking here.
Beware – the theater only seats 100, so tickets may sell out soon.
For full disclosure: I am involved in promoting the film, but make no money off of it. My involvement is simply as a labor of love, because I wish to further the interesting research behind the film.
I’ve discussed this research a bit on this blog in the past, and will have more to say on it in the future, but to summarize briefly: what happens to people who go on a low-carb diet, lose weight, dramatically improve all of their metabolic markers (such as blood glucose, blood pressure, insulin levels, and inflammatory markers) but see their cholesterol rise? Does their risk for a heart attack go up, down, or stay the same? The conventional wisdom is that high cholesterol is bad, full stop, and therefore the message from mainstream medicine has frequently been that low-carb diets are dangerous due to the rise in cholesterol that some experience. However, even accepting that high cholesterol is a risk factor for heart disease, it is a much weaker one than high blood pressure, diabetes, or about a dozen other factors, so I believe the question of whether or not low-carb diets increase cardiovascular risk is a serious question and one worthy of study. The Cholesterol Code film documents research into this fascinating area and why – even in those individuals who experience an astronomical rise in cholesterol on a low-carb diet – the effects on risk for cardiovascular disease may be a lot more nuanced than we would otherwise be led to believe.
A few key points:
The film will be shown at 7:00 pm on Monday, April 13, 2026 at the AMC Dartmouth 11 theater
The film will only be shown if a critical mass of people buy tickets (65, to be precise). If you reserve tickets and we don’t hit this critical mass, you will not be charged anything, so there is no risk to reserving tickets now
Again, I have no incentive in promoting the film other than being interested in the topic. I do not make even one penny from the proceeds.
Hope to see you there. Click below to watch the trailer.
