Cholesterol research needed page

[Helen85]

Hi all

I am a student Dietitian and I want to do an essay on cholesterol. Would anyone have any links to reliable research data that I could use for this? Obviously I believe the whole 'cholesterol is bad for you!' is a wrong but I need something to prove my aguement.

Thanks in advance

Helen

[noodletoy]

start here:

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/forum/thread4723.html

[Omni]

Here's another one:
Foods High in Cholesterol Could Save Your Health!

Have a read of a few things then come back with a more specific direction, there is enough information out there to write a set of encyclopedia's, so to condense into an essay you can only answer some of the questions, so what is the line of questions you want to answer?
Cholesterol in itself is not bad just like glucose is not bad, but it is the question of high cholesterol levels and what does it tell us, it is an indicator that the body is doing more repairs than normally required.
Maybe you can narrow down your discussion and try to answer one specific question regarding cholesterol and health and I suppose depending on who will mark your essay and whether it is more important for you to get a good grade or to make a point, this will temper the flavour of the question you ask.
Maybe look to answer the question of whether the current guidelines are relevant to women, or older women specifically as there is a lot of evidence to suggest older women have a lower "All cause Mortality" if their total cholesterol is in the higher range of 200-250ng/dl.
Or maybe discuss whether the total cholesterol is relevant at all and maybe other indicators like HDL:Trig ratio is more valid etc.

I think it will be easier to answer a more specific question, if your discussion is too broad then it will be lacking adequate detail/evidence and will allow the reader to consider it an opinion piece because of their own pre existing bias.
Just some food for thought.

[magicmerl]

Griffs Primer (in my sig) is good if all you have to work with are the conventional numbers.

It's a lot of reading, but Peter Attia's Straight Dope on Cholesterol is the most comprehensive guide I have found on the internet. Sadly, his pair of guest posts on MDA were not nearly as good, since it compressed his series down into two posts without leaving anything out, making it too confusing for the average bear.

[Helen85]

thank you omni, that is really good advice, ill maybe look at something more specific, as it is only a 500 word essay. Thanks for the links too.

[Annlee]

The straight dope on cholesterol

Start here - there are 9 parts, there are lots of references.