Cardiologist: "Weight training hardens the heart muscle."

[JFord]

I see him every 6 months for blood and every 2 years for nuclear stress test.

Is your cardiologist getting the nuclear stress tests on you in the absence of cardiac symptoms? Does he have a financial interest in a nuclear medicine clinic? I'd say you don't even need that!

[sergiogodoymd]

What the world literature needs is a RCT of SS vs. Broshit properly design and executed.

[Elephant]

He may have been referring to an ultrasound carotid intima-media thickness measurement, which at one time was thought to be a good surrogate for vascular disease, but this has since been disproved. If he's suggesting to do it to randomly look for carotid stenosis in an asymptomatic patient, well, I believe that's generally frowned upon as well. If you really wanted to have a test that would give you an idea of the extent of your vascular disease, if any, then I believe that the calcium score CT is the test you want to get, although you'll likely have to pay for it yourself, since it's rarely covered by insurance.

The idea was to look for plaque buildup in an effort to convince me I needed statins in light of somewhat elevated cholesterol levels. I'm asymptomatic (unless you consider somewhat elevated cholesterol levels to be a symptom).

He was also suggesting an abdominal u/s (I don't remember the exact name) for much the same purpose.

[George Christiansen]

Cardiologists generally know fuckall about exercise physiology. Cardiologists know cardiology stuff.

(Usually. I work with cardiologists. Every now and then you meet one who is actually as dumb as a sack of hammers, as in most other fields of human endeavour.)

Slightly off topic, but I recently came across someone pointing to a survey (I cannot remember the source) where professionals across a tone of fields all rated the % of their peers that they didn't think were complete assclowns at between 5-15%.

This has been my own experience if the fields I know enough to judge. I am curious how this lines up with yours in the medical world?

This cardiologist, on this particular occasion, on this particular topic, is talking out his AOA cardiologist asshole, waving his hands on something he knows nothing about on the basis of no good evidence whatsoever, spewing uninformed cardiologist opinion all over the exam room like Mr. Hanky, and doing a disservice to his patient in the process.

It seems a lot of doctors try to achieve do no harm via take no risk. The "logic" seems to be that 0% of people who never get under a bar have negative effects from barbell training, so just avoid the barbell.

[Brodie Butland]

It seems a lot of doctors try to achieve do no harm via take no risk. The "logic" seems to be that 0% of people who never get under a bar have negative effects from barbell training, so just avoid the barbell.

And yet, ironically, there are demonstrable negative effects from avoiding the barbell...and demonstrable positive effects from getting under the bar.

Oh well. I was told three years ago that I had more muscle than my skeletal frame was built to allow. (Though admittedly I have the bone structure of a teenage girl.) My squat and deadlift have nearly doubled since then, so I guess it's just a matter of time before my quads and hamstrings simply fall off my femur.

[Pluripotent]

It seems a lot of doctors try to achieve do no harm via take no risk. The "logic" seems to be that 0% of people who never get under a bar have negative effects from barbell training, so just avoid the barbell.

Perhaps. But, as I'm sure you're aware, there is risk in doing something as well as risk in not doing something. The trick is to balance these risks and decide on a course of action (or inaction) accordingly. Also, doing nothing dose not absolve one of responsibility. It is a decision, just as doing something is a decision, and there are consequences. I believe the consequences of a sedentary lifestyle are well established, and I have seen enough of the end stage sedentary phenotype to be of the opinion that the consequences are particularly horrendous.

[George Christiansen]

I understand and agree with what Brodie and Pluripotent write, but I am talking from the doctor's perspective of responsibility and blame. Essentially prescribing the barbell is setting yourself up for being blamed for the likely to be stupid shit done with said barbell.

Considering what most people are actually going to do with a barbell, I'd personally be pointing people in the direction of some second or third best substitute if I didn't know what and who I know regarding good form and programming.

I have friends living too far from myself, any SS coach, or anyone I know and trust enough to get them started right that I would still tell not to try SS because i know they are to motor moronic to learn the lifts on their own. I am guessing that they represent the majority of people.

How many people show up at the SS seminars confident that they have good form only to find otherwise?

[DoctorWho]

(Though admittedly I have the bone structure of a teenage girl.)

Same thing with Ira Einhorn.

There is one thing that is well documented for making a hardened heart muscle: bad women.

[tnumrych]

I'm currently finishing a paramedic program. We are at the moment in the 12 Lead EKG module of the class (which for me is essentially a review, given my educational background), which is being taught by a fairly smart, long time paramedic. Today we were covering left ventricular hypertrophy EKG manifestations. It's like I could almost read the instructors mind when he covered the risk factors for the etiology of LVH, because right after he mentioned the usual pathological causes for the changes he uttered the words "athletes".

It took nearly every ounce of my being to stop myself from yelling "BULLSHIT!" at the top of my lungs.

Now I know this is bullshit, I've read many a study proving it's bullshit, but the problem is the other 23 people in my class that haven't. And with that the cycle continues as they will now be armed with just enough knowledge to be dangerous.

[Mark Rippetoe]

How many people show up at the SS seminars confident that they have good form only to find otherwise?

Most of them. The better question is, how many show up with such bad form that they will hurt themselves? Very few.