342. Atherosclerosis Part 1

Transcript Of Today's Episode

Announcer: You're listening to The Doctor Is In Podcast, brought to you by martinclinic.com. During the episode, the doctors share a lot of information. As awesome as the info may be, it is not intended to diagnose, cure, treat, or prevent any disease. It's strictly for informational purposes.

Dr. Martin: Well, good morning, everyone. I'm going to call this week Anniversary Week. So 46 years ago today in 1974, I started practice. So [00:00:30] that's a long time ago. We're going to talk today about atherosclerosis. So this morning we're going to do some teaching on a condition called atherosclerosis, big word, hardening of the arteries, blockage of the arteries, and very common today. Actually, there was a study out and I can't remember if I actually mentioned this or not, but [00:01:00] they're showing ... And I think I might've said this a few weeks ago, but it was a study that I flagged and it was saying that atherosclerosis, here, let me just quote, "progresses rapidly in people over 40 years old." So the hardening of the arteries and blockages, either in the coronary artery, which is obviously very dangerous for strokes, [00:01:30] and the carotid artery ... Did I say carotid or coronary? Coronary, of course, with the heart, the heart and carotid stroke. Right?

Dr. Martin: And those are the ones that have a tendency to harden up. The problem is in terms of symptoms, a lot of people wouldn't even know that they have this, and it's progressing rapidly. [00:02:00] Now, I want to talk to you about some of the factors in that. What does harden your arteries? What causes the buildup of plaque in the arteries, whether they be the coronary arteries or the carotid artery? And a lot of times it's asymptomatic, meaning that you don't even know it's happening because [00:02:30] there's no red light going off on the top of your head saying your arteries are starting to harden. You're losing its elasticity.

Dr. Martin: So I want to go over some of the factors this morning. What does that inside of your arteries? How to protect your arteries from atherosclerosis. Now, you guys know me and I've been talking about this [00:03:00] for years, so I'm going to remain consistent. What you see in the arteries, what that plaque that you saw, that little buildup pub like gum almost in the arteries is not cholesterol. So for 30, 40 years, we've been looking for love in all the wrong places because we have this idea, and I'll just repeat [00:03:30] it, that what makes that happen inside the arteries, what causes the plaque is cholesterol, and therefore we must lower cholesterol. And medicine in general has been fixated on lowering cholesterol because they see the plaque and cholesterol is there, guys, [00:04:00] in the arteries, but it belongs in the arteries. Like I've said, blaming cholesterol for heart disease is like blaming the police because they're at the crime scene. The police are not the bad guys. The bad guys, we're going to talk about that this morning. What happens to develop plaque?

Dr. Martin: And there are several factors. Well, I'll tell you one thing. And still today, every doctor in [00:04:30] the universe, every doctor in the universe would agree, and I agree with them, that one of the main factors to develop plaque is smoking. And guys, I mean this, the only dent in heart disease really, because it's still ... I said this last week. You might be on CNN or wherever you watch your news and you see, it's like a counter. [00:05:00] They're counting how many people get COVID, how many people are dying. And every day it's like a ticker tape. But what we're not counting are yesterday in the United States, these are statistics, over 2,000 people died of a heart attack and probably another thousand or so died from stroke yesterday. We're not talking about that.

Dr. Martin: But back in the '80s, there [00:05:30] was a dent in heart disease temporarily. It made a difference. People got the memo, generally. And that is quit smoking. People come into my office and they would, "Doc, aren't you going to talk to me about quitting smoking?" You know, the ones that smoke. And I said, "Well, if I got to tell you to quit smoking, I don't have to tell you that. You know that. Why [00:06:00] do I have to tell you that? You know better." If you're smoking today, in this day and age, you know better than that. So do I got to tell you that? No, that's not my ... My expertise is telling you to quit developing atherosclerosis. So smoking made a dent, but guess what? It only made a dent for a few years. Then we got a new smoking. What was it? Everyone knows that. What's the answer? Sugar. Sugar [00:06:30] became the new smoking, because in the 1970s they changed the sugar. We went to high fructose corn syrup.

Dr. Martin: The people in the tobacco industry, I'm telling you, in the 1950s, they weren't stupid. They added extra nicotine to hook people. Nobody went to jail, although Philips and ... I don't know, [00:07:00] companies. I can't even remember the names of the tobacco companies. All I know is my dad smoked Buckingham. I remember seeing ... I'm old enough to tell you guys this, that there used to be commercials in magazines. When I was a kid, I liked to read Life magazine and Time magazine. My dad used to get them into the house. And I remember this, that there was actually advertisements on ... You know what [00:07:30] the doctor's choice was for cigarettes? I'm not kidding you. It said, "Here's the doctor's choice of cigarettes." You know what it was? Camel.

Dr. Martin: Guys, seriously. They used to advertise cigarettes. And they said, "Your doctor favorite cigarette is Camels." You remember that? Anybody here old enough to remember any of this? You got to be ancient like me. [00:08:00] Seriously. We've come a long way guys. But now we have a new smoking. It's called sugar and crappy vegetable oils and carbohydrates coming out the wing wang, coming out our ears. So now I'm going to talk to you about factors that create that plaque in your arteries. Now all of these things lead to inflammation. So when you see a chart and you [00:08:30] hear people talking about inflammation, it damages your blood vessels. Yes, absolutely. But remember what the Martin Clinic has said, inflammation is not Houdini. Inflammation don't come out of nowhere. So that inflammation that damages your arteries creates plaque and starts to gum up those arteries. It doesn't come out of nowhere.

Dr. Martin: Now I'm going to talk to you where inflammation comes [00:09:00] from. So yes, inflammation is a factor, but inflammation's not Houdini. The number one factor is insulin. It's food. It's not fat. It's not protein. It's insulin. And it comes from sugar and carbohydrates and even crappy vegetable oils that you get in the middle aisles of [00:09:30] your grocery store. And the tobacco company, remember what they did. They put in extra nicotine. They made that smoking addictive. You know what the food industry, which is a trillion dollar industry, by the way, not billions trillions ... And they're not stupid. They're marketers. This is a fact, guys. I'm just telling you. What you get in the middle aisles of your grocery store has been engineered [00:10:00] to hook you. And when they want to do something, you know where they start? The food industry. Doesn't start with me, my age. They're saying, "Ah, Dr. Martin, he's an old fogey. We don't care about him. We're going after the kids."

Dr. Martin: If you want to find out the history of cereals and how they hooked the generation, telling people not to have bacon and eggs, they changed our breakfast. [00:10:30] They started with that. "Oh, you're going to have a heart attack if you eat bacon and eggs. Cut back on that. No more butter guys. Margarine." And you know what? They hooked the world. And they made their cereals very tasty. They made their cereals very tasty. And what did they do? "Frosted Flakes are great," says Tony the Tiger. [00:11:00] Cheerios are just wonderful, but they're full of whole wheat. True or false? That's exactly what they did. And they hooked generation after generation of people. They hooked them. They changed their mind. They changed their habits. They got away from the farm.

Dr. Martin: And they told you that cholesterol, which is only found, by the way, in the animal kingdom, they said, "Don't eat that stuff. It's not good for you. Limit [00:11:30] your eggs. Don't eat butter. Butter's fat. Butter's cholesterol." Just look at it. What does butter look like? Look at bacon. Every day, even on our Facebook page, people come after me because, "Dr. Martin, bacon? Are you serious?" I'm very serious.

Dr. Martin: They hoped us the tobacco industry, they were smart, right? I mean, if you're [00:12:00] talking about sales, they were smart. If you're talking about food, give the food industry credit. You have to give them credit for their marketing strategy. It worked. They hooked everybody on stinking sugar. They even got the American Heart Association to put a heart on the box of cereals. I tell them, "Yeah, no wonder, because if you eat that stuff, you're going to have a heart attack, for sure." "Oh, Dr. Martin, I got to have my oatmeal every day, [00:12:30] otherwise I don't go to the bathroom." Well, don't go to the bathroom. No, but seriously, guys. Seriously, when we look at plaque, where does it come from? Inflammation? Where does inflammation come from? Insulin? Where does insulin come from? Well, it's a food hormone, but insulin resistance comes from sugars. Crappy carbs. You guys know that. So I'm just telling you, atherosclerosis. [00:13:00] And they're saying, "No." We know so much more than we used to, that at the age of 40, it just goes like ... it skyrockets.

Dr. Martin: And this is why we have done nothing to get rid of heart disease. Like guys, you take a statin drug. I get it. I understand it. They push it, push it, push it. The number one selling medication of all time, Lipitor. It's for atherosclerosis to keep your [00:13:30] cholesterol down. It's aiming at the wrong thing. I read a study on the weekend that shows that statin drugs, cholesterol, Lipitor, Zocor, Crestor, the big ones, they're statin drugs. What do they do? They lower cholesterol. They lower LDL. They lower LDL. I don't care about LDL. [00:14:00] Guys, if you want me to look at your blood work and I'll give you my comments on your blood work, get your blood work done. I'll be happy to glance at it for you.

Dr. Martin: But guys, when I go through your lipids, I'm only looking for two things. You know. I want to know what your good cholesterol is, HDL, and I want to know what your triglycerides are, TGs, triglycerides, three fat balls. [00:14:30] How do you make three fat balls? Sugar. That's a big factor, guys. When you have a crappy diet, your triglycerides go like this ... and your good cholesterol goes like this ... It's simple biochemistry. That's how your body works. "Oh, Dr. Martin. I want to get my cholesterol down." No you don't. Why? I'm trying to turn that wood into fat. You want fat in your brain. [00:15:00] Fat doesn't clog up your arteries. So when you have that piece of steak, it's not clogging your arteries. It's actually de-clogging them. "Now, be careful, Dr. Martin." No, I'm telling you it's de-clogging them. How does it do that? Well, it increases your HDL.

Dr. Martin: The only way you can increase your HDL is to elevate, because HDL is good [00:15:30] cholesterol. It's the FedEx. It's Canada Post it's U.S. Post. It's UPS. It's Purolator. You name the transport companies, Amazon, they're on the blood vessels and they're taking triglycerides, bad fats, out of your body. And you make triglycerides from sugars. This is why the reset is so good. It takes those bad fats [00:16:00] out of your body. I know it's simplistic, guys, but it's the truth. The truth. It's not popular. It's not a popularity contest, but guys, you guys get it. Why are you trying to lower your cholesterol? I don't get it. Well, I get it, but it's not science. They were going to put cholesterol medication in the drinking water in the [00:16:30] United Kingdom, in the UK. They'd actually brought it to parliament and they were going to pass it. They put a stop to it. But I'm telling you because the whole world has gone for the cholesterol hoax. It's not true. Well, if it was true, we would have got rid of heart disease by now.

Dr. Martin: It's food, guys. It's food. Cut your carbs. Cut your sugars. You don't need it. Now, I'm not saying vegetables and fruit. [00:17:00] Those are good carbs. For a lot of people, by the way, you don't live on that stuff. But generally, you're not going to make ... You're making it from crappy sugars, especially high fructose corn syrup. You see, sugar has got 50 different names today. That's the food industry. They're liars, liars pants on fires. They lied through their teeth. And one of the biggest factors is obesity. But guys, [00:17:30] obesity is a symptom. Here's another thing that came out this weekend, that I read this weekend. It came out last week, but I read it on Saturday, whatever, flagged it.

Dr. Martin: Listen to this. One out of five children in the USA, one out of five children in the USA are obese. One out of five children. Guys, obesity is a symptom of insulin [00:18:00] resistance. Imagine that a kid, a kid, they got a sugar belly. They don't drink beer, so it's not a beer belly. It's a sugar belly. And what that does, it elevates insulin. Well, insulin does that, but then it elevates inflammation, I mean. And inflammation is silent. Because we think of inflammation as pain. Well, it could be, but they don't ... Kids don't get pain [00:18:30] from eating ice cream. What they get is inflammation, and inflammation starts to damage their blood vessels. The first ones that are damaged are the little blood vessels in your body called capillaries. That's what runs your eyes. That's what runs your kidneys, guys. It's so important. This is so important.

Dr. Martin: So obesity is a huge factor, and kids, one out of five. Well, we know. We look at the world today. [00:19:00] I was going to say, "Let's go to the mall today." You and I, go to the mall. Well, we can't, it's closed. But if we could, if we just sat and you and I had a coffee together ... I'd love to do that by the way, okay? But if we could just sit and then we watch people walking by, if you were observant and if you weren't, I'd point it out to you, look at all big people are today. Look at how much [00:19:30] bigger. Guys, go back and watch a movie from the 1950s or the 1960s. Everybody is this big. Have you noticed that, around? They're small. They're tiny, waist and all that.

Dr. Martin: And guys, I don't mean they were that healthy. Because they were smoking. They didn't get obesity from smoking, but oh, did they get damage on their arteries, big time. And they were told to smoke. It was good for them. I'm not kidding you. In the 1950s, people were told to smoke. [00:20:00] What's your doctor's favorite cigarette? Camels. I don't think we had camels in Canada. If we did, I don't remember. My dad smoked Buckingham. My mother, Peter Jackson. I stole a few of her ... I liked Peter Jackson better than Buckingham as a kid because they had filters on it. My dad's Buckinghams, he smoked it without a filter. Four packs a day, my dad. Unbelievable. Okay, so we already talked [00:20:30] about triglycerides. We talked about high triglycerides, low HDL. It's food. Obesity is food, guys. It's not genetics. It's not genetic. It's what you eat.

Dr. Martin: But again, high blood pressure, like I've talked to you last week or two weeks ago, I talked to you about insulin resistance and one of the main factors in insulin resistance. Check the engine light [00:21:00] that's on. Click, click, click, click, your engine light's on. If you have high blood pressure, where do you think high blood pressure comes from? High blood pressure comes from insulin, resistance to insulin. Your body's created inflammation that can elevate your blood pressure. Well you say, "Doc, what about kidneys? What about salt?" What salt? You're blaming salt for what sugar does. It's not salt. You know how many people ... I mean millions and millions [00:21:30] of people, they don't have salt anymore, especially my generation. My generation, hook, line and sinker. "Oh, better. Not have too much salt." Right? How many people did that? They don't have salt. I can't stand food without salt. No, but seriously, it's not salt. "Don't have salt." No, it's sugar. Lower your sugar. You'll be shocked what happens to your blood pressure.

Dr. Martin: Now, I'm not telling you to get off medication. [00:22:00] I'm not telling you that. So don't come after me about that. Don't come off your medication if you need medication, but change your diet and then see if you still need medication. I've had thousands of patients over the years, they were able to come off their meds with their doctors because their blood pressure was normal again. But don't come on for your meds if you don't change your diet, because it's diet.

Dr. Martin: I think this is going to be a two-part series because I didn't even [00:22:30] get to half of the factors. At the end you get the atherosclerosis, but it shows what insulin does. And then low levels ... And we'll talk about this tomorrow, low levels of nitric oxide. I'm going to explain nitric oxide to you tomorrow, how that is a big factor in your coronary artery disease. What is nitric oxide? We're going to talk about that. It's a big factor. [00:23:00] But again, you'll notice that we'll come back to why would you have low levels of nitric oxide, big factor, high levels of homocysteine? What is homocysteine? We'll talk about that. There are factors in there, but we'll do that tomorrow because I want to explain it properly. I want to explain it properly.

Dr. Martin: So atherosclerosis, hardening of the [00:23:30] arteries. It progresses rapidly after 40 with no symptoms, necessarily. You need to look for these things that I talked to you about today. So when you get your blood work done, look at two things, two major things when you get your blood work done. I mean, look at your A1C. It's important. That's a three-month calculation of your sugars. But elevated [00:24:00] blood sugar, remember what I'm saying. Elevated blood sugar, it's the last thing that occurs. Because if you got elevated blood sugar, you're a diabetic. But before you're actually diagnosed with diabetes, other things are happening inside the body and your blood work will determine that. I'll show it to you.

Dr. Martin: You look at your liver enzymes. You look at triglycerides, HDL and TGs, your good cholesterol, HDL. [00:24:30] You look at that stuff, I can tell you a hundred percent if you got atherosclerosis developing in your body without doing a CAT scan or a scan to look at your arteries. They won't do that. Generally, they're not looking at that. But there's other factors, and tomorrow we're going to look at those. We're going to look at nitric oxide. We're going to look at homocysteine. We're going to look at vitamin K2, which is a huge [00:25:00] factor in atherosclerosis. Vitamin K2, vitamin B12, atherosclerosis. Vitamin D, atherosclerosis. We're going to explain that. I'm going to do a teaching. Might take me three days. It's possible. Isn't this important? Because the number one killer today, number one, number one, is [00:25:30] heart disease cancers. Cancer's just about there. It's almost caught up. But guys, still number one on the hit parade.

Dr. Martin: I start my book out like that. How are you going to die? It's pretty morbid. It's pretty morbid, but I talk the truth. I tell people, how are you going to die? Well, number one is accidents. That's still the number one way to die. But I'm not talking about that because guys, that's fake [00:26:00] and I'm not talking about fake. You're in the wrong place at the wrong time. You have an accident, could kill you. Car accidents, right? But I'm not talking about that. You can be a good driver and still be in an accident because you can't control what the other person's doing. But all I'm saying is what you can control is what goes into your mouth, food. And I'm a food guy. 1974, 2,000 hours already of nutrition. And [00:26:30] what we know today, guys, is incredible.

Dr. Martin: You never stop learning, right? You never stop learning. So I just kept going and going and going and taking courses and working a PhD in nutrition. And I love food. I love eating it like you. I don't know about you, but I love food. My wife is the best cook in the universe. I mean it. I married her, lucky me. And [00:27:00] Rosie right now is doing a cookbook with Jeanette and Nicole and they're all helping out. These girls, I'm telling you, they're the best cooks in the world. And we're going to talk about food in the cookbook. They're doing a cookbook. We got some recipes for my new book, too. Fantastic. What to eat.

Dr. Martin: Okay, so guys, if you get a chance, share this with your friends, get the message [00:27:30] out. And tomorrow we're going to continue to look at atherosclerosis. I'm going to talk to you about other factors. This morning we talked about obesity, inflammation, about HDL and triglycerides, but we'll continue tomorrow. So love you guys. You got any questions, remember, and the other thing is send in your questions. If you can't make that live one, it's sort of a radio [00:28:00] show format on Zoom. But if you can't make that, we love it, but if you can't, Fridays, I take your questions. And I try and answer question and answer Fridays. So that's sort of what we're looking forward to this upcoming week, Lord willing. Okay. Love you guys. Talk to you soon.

Announcer: You've reached the end of another Doctor Is In Podcast with your hosts, Dr. Martin Jr. and [00:28:30] Sr. Be sure to catch our next episode and thanks for listening.

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