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Proof that saturated fat, doesn’t raise your fat levels

The fatty acid implicated in health troubles is palmitoleic acid. A diet high in carbs, raises their levels, a diet high in saturated fats, keeps them low.

You’re a heart attack waiting to happen…….

• You’re decidedly heavier than you should be
• Your blood pressure is higher than it should be
• You’ve got “high” cholesterol, and
• Your triglyceride levels are high

Ouch !

Everyone wants you to follow a low fat diet.  Well almost everyone.

The dissenting voices

There are voices in the wilderness proclaiming the way to better cardiovascular health is to dump the carbs and embrace the fats.  Specifically saturated fats.

I am one of those voices.

I give the advice to anyone with health troubles – but I know, for many people, it takes a giant leap of faith, to embrace saturated fats.   The reason it is so difficult to follow this advice, is for years we’ve been told, saturated fats cause heart disease.

Making the shift

Isn’t easy.  For many people, the idea of embracing saturated fat, is just too left of centre, to adopt.

So they maintain the status quo.

There are a few people, who make an attempt to make the shift, unfortunately, they often adopt only half of the idea. They cut the carbs, a little or a lot, but instead of switching in saturated fat, they switch in unsaturated fats, especially seed/vegetable oils.  ]

Seed oils, are fat, but they’re not considered to be saturated fats and biochemically they’re quite different from saturated fats.

It is saturated fats – the meat, eggs, cream, butter that are the key to heart health.

Fear keeps many people locked in old dietary habits…….

What if you’re wrong ?

If I’m wrong………………………..  you’re a gonna.

I get it.

This is why I want to share with you, a research study from Ohio State University.  This study, tested out the two diabolically opposed diet approaches, and everything in between, on 16 people with metabolic syndrome.

Trying out ALL the options

What makes this study particularly valuable is each person experienced a spectrum of diets.  In this programme, the ratio of saturated fat to carbs was modified every 3 weeks for 6 months.

The calorie count was kept constant.

To make it easy to stick with the programme, the food was all prepared in the science lab’s kitchen.  What a pleasure…….. no cooking, no dishes for 6 months.

They started off on a very low carb/high saturated fat diet consisting of 47 g of carbs with 84 g of fat. Transitioning in a step wise fashion, all the way down to a high carb/low saturated fat diet, composed of 346 g of carb/day, with 32  g of saturated fat/day.

Along the way, everything was checked.

The usual stuff, like weight, blood pressure, glucose levels etc.  and fatty acid profiles. This is more than just checking the cholesterol and triglyceride levels, it checks which fatty acids, are in the blood.

TOO MUCH palmitoleic acid

One of the fatty acids associated  with health troubles is palmitoleic acid.  It’s a 16 carbon, with a single double bond, at the 7^th carbon, making it an omega-7.   It can be eaten, but it is primarily homemade, which makes it a good marker, to access,  body chemistry.

It’s consistently UP, in people with  metabolic syndrome and type 2 diabetes.

The researchers found, the more carbs eaten – the higher the levels of palmitoleic acid.

Ironically,  when the same people ate lots of saturated fat, the levels of this bad boy was at it’s  lowest.  This can be seen in this graph, the line at zero, represents the level of palmitoleic acid at baseline i.e. before ANY dieting, happened.  The lower the carbs in the diet, the lower it’s level.

Change from baseline in plasma palmitoleic acid (16:1) in subjects who consumed a very low carbohydrate diet (C1) and then gradually transitioned to a high carbohydrate diet over six sequential phases .  Copyright 2014 Volk et al. 

The effect was more pronounced in some people, than others, but pretty consistent.

Unbelievable ?

More than altered lipid profile

Now the focus in this study was on the lipid profile.  But, the usual things measured by doctors, also showed improvements on the lower carb diet.  Here is a plot of HOMA levels, this is a number that estimates the level of insulin resistance.

Going low carb, brought a very rapid, and dramatic,  improvement.

Cumulative change from baseline in insulin resistance determined from homeostatic model assessment (HOMA),  in 16 subjects who switched to a very low carbohydrate diet and then incrementally increased carbohydrate every 3 wk over six sequential phases (C1RC2RC3RC4RC5RC6).  Copyright  2014 Volk et al

Dietary saturated fat is not the problem

Logic says – eating lots of fat, will cause fat levels to be high.

But, biochemistry is not always logical.

This study demonstrates, when you fuel yourself using saturated fats, your body uses them up.  As long as you’re not eating TOO MUCH, they don’t get stored.  But, when you primarily fuel yourself with carbs, even if you’re not eating TOO MUCH, your body goes into “storage” mode……………… and it stores the carbs, AS FAT.

The bad FAT, the FAT, that is associated with METABOLIC TROUBLES. Eish !

Eat more saturated fat and less carbs

So………………………if you’re a heart attack waiting to happen – the smart move is to embrace saturated fat, while at the same time, limiting your consumption of carbs.

I know it’s radical, but biochemically speaking, it’s the right thing go do.

Y

Further reading

Interested in learning more about the chemistry behind those extra fat layers ?