LOW CHOLESTEROL DOESN'T MEAN YOU'RE HEALTHY

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, January 10, 1992                   TAG: 9201100109
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: NEW YORK                                LENGTH: Short
LOW CHOLESTEROL DOESN'T MEAN YOU'RE HEALTHY
People with normal cholesterol levels and high amounts of blood fats may be four times as likely as others to suffer a heart attack, and could be wrongly given a clean bill of health, researchers say.
Researchers said that many doctors do not understand the significance of elevated levels of the blood fats called triglycerides. As a result, many people with normal cholesterol levels are not identified as having special risks.
Nevertheless, the study found that these people should be identified and treated. "This population had the greatest risk and the greatest benefit," said the study's director, M. Heikki Frick of the Helsinki University Central Hospital in Finland.
People whose total level of blood cholesterol contained a high proportion of so-called "bad cholesterol" and who had high triglyceride levels were 3.8 times as likely as others to have a heart attack, Frick said.
This is true even in people whose total cholesterol is normal or only slightly elevated, he said. The study appears in January's issue of Circulation, published by the American Heart Association.
The study also showed that the heart attack risk could be cut 71 percent by lowering triglyceride levels and raising the levels of "good cholesterol," otherwise known as high-density lipoproteins, or HDLs.
The improvement can be accomplished by losing weight and exercise or by drugs. The study used a drug called gemfibrozil.

by Archana Subramaniam by CNB