Management of Lipoprotein(a) Cholesterol with Diet and Supplements: A Case Study

Understanding heart diseases, particularly the risk of heart attack, strokes, valvular diseases requiring stents or cardiac surgery, is a dynamic field. Heart diseases, particularly coronary heart disease (CHD), remain the #1 risk of disability and death in western countries in both men and women. The traditional risk factors for early CHD are smoking, diabetes mellitus, hypertension, elevated cholesterol, and a family history of early CHD. The standard lipid profile has served as a mainstay of CHD risk assessment for decades.

Lipoprotein(a) (Lp[a]) is a type of cholesterol particle that is not measured on standard lab panels. Measure Lp(a) can help refine strategies of CHD risk assessment. Lp(a) has huge importance as it is estimated to be elevated in approximately 20% of the world’s population and is genetically determined. It is a complex structure that has a low-density lipoprotein (LDL) particle with an added apolipoprotein(a) via a totally different hepatic pathway than LDL cholesterol. If inherited, the level of Lp(a) in the blood is elevated and has the potential to do harm by 1–2 years of age! Ongoing strategies to lower Lp(a) in patients at risk or with proven CHD are a recent focus of pharmaceutical companies but none are approved for use at this time. This case study indicates that “natural”…