The Book Depository The Homocysteine Solution by Patrick Holford

Author: JW

Rating: 5

Review: This book was recommended to me by my Hollistic Therapist. Described to me as a life saver! I bought this book to educate myself further and I’m so glad I did!! Just wish I’d known about Homocysteine last year before we suddenly and most unexpectedly lost our dear brother in law! It’s a MUST read and I’m telling everyone I know about getting their Homocysteine checked and of course to read this book!

Author: Tiberiu Pana

Rating: 3

Review: I enjoy reading health books and try to read about different approaches to achieving a healthy life. This one here is a good one but dare I say dangerous book if this is one's first heath book read. Homocysteine in a non-scientific explanation, is a marker for health, which the author argues it is better than other markers like the cholesterol checking. Bear in mind while reading this book that Patrick Holford, the author, isn't the one who discovered the homocysteine, but wanted to grow the awareness of it. The author explains what homocysteine is and how it affects us and then proceeds at recommending a diet and supplements to remedy one's health status. The diet and supplement recommendations are separated from the homocysteine science and is all the author's view on how the homocysteine marker can be lowered in a person. Mr Holford keeps saying throughout his book how a high level of homocysteine could affect us and bring a plethora of bad events upon us from birth defects to cancer and even plain migraines. There is actually a whole list the author provides, and it's almost everything you can imagine, which apparently is caused by a high level of homocysteine. Caused by homocysteine...now this is the main focus of the author. And he argues that with a proper diet (of his devise) and supplements we can achieve super healthy status (along with enough physical and mental activities - but he doesn't focus on these ones). The high level of homocysteine though is actually caused by a bad diet. So one can argue that bad eating habits contribute greatly towards those awful diseases. But this is not what the author wants you to concentrate on, he argues that is the high homocysteine level directly provokes them. The author says, and this is probably why so many people have him in high regard, that drugs are not the solution but diet and supplements. He ticks a lot of boxes when he argues against drugs. He also argues that doctors shouldn't say diet or supplement will get you better, but diet and supplements will get you better...therefore greatly promoting the supplements. But what are supplements? Are they natural food or drugs? Well, since they're chemically synthesized in a laboratory or plant, can they be natural food? I honestly think not. Plenty of scientific evidence on how supplements are badly absorbed by our body. What's worse there's evidence that if we supplement long term, we will diminish our abilities to absorb nutriments from food and thus rely wholly on supplementing. Don't know about you, but that is a chilling thought for me. My opinion is that we should look to our eating habits and along the way we should look about engaging in good, fun physical and mental activities for a healthy life. It's true that if we find ourselves in bad health and want to regain our health faster, we should supplement as well, but that can only be a short term decision. Supplementing long term will eventually bring us down...hard. To end the longest review I've made so far, a couple of notes about Mr Holford's recommended diet: 1) The author recommends lean meat as opposed to saturated fat. Don't know what is the evidence he can came up with to support this, but now there is a ton of evidence of how indispensable is saturated fat to support good health, and I encourage everybody to read it. Lean meat is 100% protein. We need protein that's for sure, but the quantity of it depends on one's daily activities, especially the physical ones. Now saturated fat, which sounds awful, but actually the best source of it is actually offal...as in liver, heart, kidney, brain and well essentially the organs of an animal. It contains a lot of vitamins and minerals which you cannot find in lean meat or vegetables for that matter and contains both protein and fat so you basically shoot 2 birds with one stone. 2) The author recommends soy. Now this is maybe he's biggest flaw in the book. There was a time when soy was extremely recommended for a healthy life, but I think in the last couple of years there have been plenty of ink on paper to destroy this myth. Yes I know the Chinese eat plenty of it...or wait...do they? This has always been the main focus of the pro soy people, but at a close inspection, a different picture forms. Chinese, and Asians for that matter, don't eat plain soy, but the fermented version of it. And even in this form, it's just one of the many things a Chinese person eats. There is no preference for soy in the Asian diet. You might think then that fermented soy products are good to eat, like the author wants you to believe. The problem is that the market versions of these products are far from what are they supposed to be. If you really want miso or tofu, do the home version of them. Don't ever buy them from a market, even an Asian one. What's funny enough is that even the author half-heartedly admits that soy might be of some trouble to those people which are allergic to soy products. I would just say avoid them like the plague. There is nothing in the soy products that you need and won't find in other food products. 3) The author has a tendency to contradict himself. He advises against grains, then he says that folate fortified grain products might be a good idea. Furthermore we provides other evidence which shows that fortified grains might not increase one's level of folate and a bit further provides evidence that the same grains increases the level of folate in a person...so are folate fortified grains good or not? On a funny side note, he recommends liver as it is rich in choline and TMG...well isn't this ironic that liver is saturated fat, the very thing Mr Holford advised against? 4) Quote: "France has one of the lowest rates of heart disease in Europe, despite a high consumption of wine, cholesterol and foods rich in saturated fat – a phenomenon called the ‘French Paradox’." Well isn't this convenient...so if evidence of the contrary appears, just label it as paradox. Hah! As a final note, what's with all these may/maybe/possibly in the author's sentences? I know the homocysteine science is only at the beginning, but still he uses one to many assumptions which makes you think how many of these presented facts are just wishful thinking...