Incredible Edible Eggs (Not Dangerous!)

I am not alone in criticizing recent research on egg consumption.  The criticism on Dr. David Spence’s own medical school website tells a big piece of the story.

First, I must say that being a clinical medical researcher is a tough row to hoe.  I always thought “bench” researchers, folks in climate controlled labs who work with mice or test tubes, had it easy compared to people trying to learn things about humans.

The hardest part, I believed for years, was simply to prove “causality,” for although it is possible to show things happen at the same time, it is generally pretty much impossible to prove something “caused” something else.

With clinical research, it is tough to “control” things. As far as I can figure, the same people who ate a lot of egg yolks had a lot of atherosclerosis in their blood vessels.

We just don’t seem to know what else they ate.

We also have not put this study into the context of other science — for volumes and volumes of research have shown atherosclerosis to be dependent upon dietary carbohydrate, and not dietary fat.

The thing I always hated most about academic research was always the egos, personalities, and politics. I don’t know how they could have played here, but the proclamation that eating egg yolks is as bad as smoking got a lot of press and scared a lot of people.

Pshaw!  Eggs are wonderful.

They are nutrition-rich, clearly containing all that a chick needs to get to hatching, as well as great goodness for the human.

Iodine, Phosphorus, vitamins A,B, D, and E.

Organic may be better, for toxins are more likely so avoided.

Omega-3 supplementation is both expensive and unnecessary, for you can get it easily elsewhere (I add mine with supplementation.)

Granted I personally love eggs.

Scientifically: well, I often seem to end up, without having chosen, to be my own experimental subject,

I remember I started to learn about carbohydrates when, for some temporary job, my husband and I took lodging in a hotel with a free daily egg breakfast,  I lowered my cholesterol considerably during that time.

The American Egg Board seems almost defensive about how wonderful eggs are.  I couldn’t believe their website had lots of pictures of egg sandwiches.

Who needs the bread?

I always felt practices like the egg-white only omelet should be punished by law. (Or at least I could eat the leftover yolks.)

This practice, to me, is as bad as eating a pecan or walnut shell and throwing away the nutmeat within.

I was in the fourth grade or so when I first heard the (almost certainly fictional) story of Christopher Columbus and the egg.  When folks expected old Chis to fall off the edge of the earth, he allegedly answered, asking if anyone in the room could stand an egg on its end.  They could not.  He promptly did so by cracking the shell a bit at one end, and said:

“It’s easy, if you know how.”

The seemingly contradictory ocean of advice about nutrition and health preservation seems frightening.

The most important thing I learned in medical school was how to find truth in a world full of pseudo science, bogus science — and now, ranting internet bloggers.

This has been my mission for my patients.  I never expected to have to save myself this way, but I have.

How to put the right things into your body, and be fairly impressively healthy and happy?

It’s easy if you know how.