Live or Die? That is My Question
Our outward appearance can only hint at the true inner state of our heart. Knowing yourself from the inside to the outside requires wisdom, prudence, discernment and grace.
Dr. Kevin Ham
Just three months ago, I thought to myself, ‘I am in the best shape of my life. My heart is so fit and strong.’ My resting heart rate of 42 and an even lower heart rate at sleep of 31 was astonishing to me. I was struck by how little my heart had to pump to supply blood flow from head to feet. Blood pressure 105/60. My max heart rate of 195 and able to withstand average heart rates of 172 for 2 hours 38 minutes during a cycling event, and a VO2 Max in the 50s, put me in the top percentile, one of the best indicators of longevity. With 12% body fat and an active cycling lifestyle and an ancestral diet, I felt and looked cardiovascularly strong, fit and healthy.
After Anita, a medical doctor and wife of my late dear friend Rob Thompson, who passed away of a sudden heart attack earlier this year on February 10th, asked everyone at his celebration of life to get a calcium heart scan, I became aware of the silently growing disease in my heart vessels. A calcium score of 500 indicated major calcified coronary disease on May 5, 2025. I received a CT Angiogram on June 17, which showed blockages in every vessel, with the most severe being a blockage in the first diagonal branch (D1) of my left anterior descending artery. A 55% blockage in my ramus intermedius, a rare branch off the left main coronary artery, that overlapped somewhat with my D1. Then several moderate blockages of 45%, 29%, 28% and many more mild obstructions under 20%. Health can only be as strong as our biggest constraint, and in my case it is my 77% blockage. To put it into perspective, one major blockage can lead to a heart attack and potentially sudden death.
This is an in-depth digest of my monthly heart journey. I pray that it helps save many lives, prevents unnecessary heart attacks and the progression of heart disease. May you take this to heart.
Patient and Medical Doctor
I’ve been blessed with a medical education and also multiple diseases so I can walk the journey of life understanding human suffering and grace, disease and relief, staring death in the face of life as both patient and doctor.
Dr. Kevin Ham
Every year, the US shows us a picture of the grim realities of heart disease.
805,000 heart attacks occur each year
605,000 are first-time heart attacks
356,000 people die from sudden cardiac arrest with minimal or no prior warning.
The average age of heart attacks in men is 65, and in women, it is 72. Women follow men by 7 years due to the protective effects of estrogen and menses. But women have a higher mortality rate of 70% from their first heart attack.
I have been duly warned and made aware that this could be me. Unaware, I could likely die of a heart attack by 65, conceivably on a hard climb while biking.
So, when did this disease start in my heart? I knew in medical school, after reading the Korean War Study on American soldiers, average age 22, that 70% of them had atherosclerosis on autopsy. I guessed that in my mid-20s, I had about 50% blockages, but later in life, I assumed my improved diet and active lifestyle would keep that all at bay. I had no risk factors other than a high LDL cholesterol of 168. I never smoked, my blood pressure was good, I had no family history, no diabetes, was lean and fit, and was not sedentary. My recent inflammation markers hsCRP (0.25) and Homocysteinewere low. I felt great and so healthy.
What I am not sure about is how much of my atherosclerosis has progressed over my life or whether it is getting worse, stable or better, but even though the numbers do not look good, I now have a baseline to measure and improve from.
My Mission: To Reverse Heart Disease
My mission: to reverse my severe blockages to 0 or no significance so I am not constrained by any plaques that can potentially rupture to cause a heart attack or impact coronary blood flow.
Then help others become aware if they have any heart disease and how to reverse any blockages through lifestyle changes. I feel like I’ve been born to do this, and feel very grateful and blessed for this opportunity. I decided to become a doctor at age 14 because an autoimmune disease hospitalized me. I dreamed of helping people afflicted with pain and suffering from disease. I could not help my own mother for her own autoimmune disease as a son or a doctor, nor from her demise from cancer. But I know I can help people with macular degeneration to stave off blindness and those with heart disease, high blood pressure or diabetes from ever succumbing life to them. I dream of helping prevent and relieve pain and suffering from cancer, which is the deadliest of killers.
My Cholesterol Cut in Half
Never underestimate the power of food and the resilience of the human body to heal and become whole again. We only need to know the simple path to life.
Viktor Frankl
For years, my LDL cholesterol was 168 mg/dL (4.34 mM). Someone with my level of heart disease should have a value under 80 mg/dL (2.0 mM). I knew my doctors would highly suggest the standard of care of a statin (cholesterol-lowering med) plus baby aspirin.
I had read Dr. Esselstyn’s book, “Preventing and Reversing Heart Disease,” over 10 years ago, so I knew that there was a diet that could reverse 100% blocked arteries in under 3 years. It seemed extreme, but his patients were patients with severe heart disease, many resistant to standard of care therapies, including bypasses, stents and medications.
I determined, after staring at my calcium score, to start the next morning on the Esselstyn diet, a radical whole food plant-based diet that was low fat, restricting all oils, fats, animal foods, fish, dairy, eggs, nuts, most seeds and even avocados to reduce dietary fat to 10% of calories. I wrote my plan the next morning for my next six months--the remainder of 2025. If I could half my LDL within 6 months to 80 mg/dL (2.0 mM), then half it again to 40 mg/dL (1.0 mM) within one year, I would be on the path to reverse my plaques.
I told my plan to Anita, and she, being a doctor, said I would need a high-dose statin, and diet wouldn’t do. My doctor friends were very concerned and suggested I get a stent. I see a sports cardiologist August 18 with a scheduled stress test. I suspect I will pass that, but I surmised that if I don’t, I would consider a stent. But my mindset is to resolve my disease by the first principles of health. With a stent, it will get clogged in 10-15 years, and I have been blessed with the mind to research and figure out the disease process and pathophysiology, with a degree in Biochemistry and medicine.
On June 17, I went to San Francisco and did a full-body assessment at Human Longevity, Inc. My heart MRI and heart echocardiogram were normal. My CT Angiogram of the heart revealed all my blockages. My calcium score was 475. It could be a difference in the machine but my May 5 calcium score was 505.
But what shocked me most was my cholesterol numbers!
My LDL cholesterol had dropped from 168 to 84. I was so excited. I had anticipated my dietary strategy to take 6 months to reach this level, but it dropped by 50% in just 5 weeks. Wow! And ten of those days were travel days where I had some ‘cheat meals’.
My total cholesterol of 158 was now lower than my LDL a month ago. Astounding! I was worried about my lipoprotein a level, which lifestyle changes cannot modify, but that was low at 40, and my apoB was reasonable at 75. Ideally, I want this below 55 to reverse plaque. I knew at that moment that it was possible for me now. Tears of joy like victory resounded in my heart! Esselstyn was right. He was the head of the Cleveland Clinic in the 1980s and is still active at age 92. He was a cardiac surgeon, and as I listened to dozens of interviews by him, I grasped all the mechanisms, health principles and reasons he spoke about, and I did my own research daily. I have many more strategies to reverse my heart disease, and I’m thinking through each one before experimenting, trying to figure out how to measure its effect going forward.
My target LDL is to be in the 40s by the end of the year. I will do monthly lipid blood tests to monitor. My two-month LDL is about 75, as my doctor only got me a total cholesterol, HDL and non-HDL level. I am going to take matters into my own hands and get full lipid profiles like the one above each month. LDL at 80 stabilizes heart disease, and below that, soft plaques get remodelled and resorbed. My goal is to get a HDL higher than LDL. My friend Raz has already accomplished this with a HDL of 129 and LDL of 84. And I plan on reviving the health of my endothelial cells, the inner lining of my blood vessels.
I had let my medical license lapse in 2015, because I was so busy with my entrepreneurial pursuits, but I am going to apply to reobtain my medical license. I plan to do health more as philanthropy rather than as a livelihood, as I’ve been blessed beyond measure by God and those around me. Thank you dearly!
Eyes are Getting Better Too
When your heart is pure, your sight is clear.
Dr. Kevin Ham
Two Sundays ago, I was listening to a sermon, and usually I have a hard time seeing the small print on the screen. But this time, it was clear and vivid, and I was so amazed that I closed one eye, then the other, to check if it was one or both eyes. Clear. I was so excited again. I wasn’t even thinking about my eyes. I then did a home eye test and found both eyes at 20/16. I learned also that my retinal pigment epithelium had drastically decreased in thickness due to my two years of receiving eye anti-VEGF injections in 2020-2022. I stopped the eye med injections over two years ago, thankfully. My good left eye RPE was only 153 now and no wonder my visual acuity is affected. I had felt the world looked less technicolour and muted. But now things look much more vivid, colourful and clear. I started thinking about what caused my macular degeneration, and I started studying the layers and cells of the retina, Bruch’s membrane and vascular layers. I then had a hypothesis. The same process that caused disease in my eyes was also happening in my carotid arteries and my heart vessels, and likely my hearing vessels.
Could I also possibly stabilize or reverse my eye and neck vessels with my heart protocol?
My Fractured Bone Analogy: How a Fractured Heart Heals Like a Broken Bone
A fractured heart can become whole again.
Dr. Kevin Ham
When you break a bone, you don’t walk on it, nor do you medicate endlessly. You immobilize it with a cast, remove any more insult or damage to the injured area, give it rest for your body to heal, nourish it and then rehabilitate it back to strength. But with the heart, that is not the current standard of care. Medicine ignores solving the root causes and tells us to pop a statin and baby aspirin until stents and bypasses are required.
The arterial wall- the endothelium- heals in much the same way as a fractured bone, in principle.
You stop any and all insults to the endothelial cells.
You protect the vessel.
You give it the necessary nutrition, time and conditions to regenerate.
You rehabilitate the bone, muscles and blood flow.
And that’s what I’ve done with my C.A.S.T. Protocol.
The HAM Heart Protocol: A 10-Step Science-Backed Healing Blueprint
The body follows the natural laws of health and breaking from these results in progressive disorder and disease. We have built a civilization of immense health debt, repayable but not through mere drugs that treat only the outward symptoms but only by treating and removing the root causes.
Dr. Kevin Ham
C.A.S.T. = My healing cast for the heart
C = Cut all oils and inflammation
No added oils
No processed fats
Whole foods only - extreme version is Esselstyn diet
Reduces endothelial damage and inflammation
A = Achieve LDL <50 mg/dL, HDL>60 mg/dL (LDL/HDL < 1)
Removes the root cause of plaque progression
Mimics lifelong low LDL found in native populations with no heart disease, and also cholesterol levels in teens and 20s
Sleep > 7 hours daily. Restores hormonal balance, reduces CRP, and promotes nighttime endothelial healing and rejuvenation. Deep sleep of 1 hour and core sleep of 4 hours makes me feel 100% REM might be 2 hours.
S = Strategic Nutrition
Whole foods, high fibre, high antioxidants
Essential nutrition to help reverse atherosclerosis that has been scientifically proven with consideration of models based on first principles of health that can be further tested and proven
Reverses atherosclerosis by reducing oxidized LDL and improving nitric oxide, which expands blood vessels
T = Time-restricted Fasting and Training
High intensity interval Training (HIIT) + Zone 3 fitness for shear stress and metabolic flexibility, collateral circulation improvement with plaque remodeling and increase HDL, lower LDL, VLDL and triglycerides and increase eNOS (more nitric oxide) and endothelial health, increases VO2max (oxygen utilization)
physical therapy for the heart vessels
24 hour weekly and 72 hour monthly fasts to lower inflammation and promote autophagy, to resorb plaque
lowers insulin, triglycerides, LDL
autophagy cleans up cancer cells, damaged cells (aka plaques)
Increases HDL
This is like rest and sleep and rejuvenation for the arteries
I’ll outline the 10-Step Heart Protocol more later when I am certain of reversal rather than just lower LDL levels.
Triple Strategy maybe even Handful Strategy
Heart vessels are complex and the center of human life. Why not approach a multi-prong lifestyle cure for not only arresting progress of heart disease but to actually reverse and cure it for all blood vessels?
Dr. Kevin Ham
I thought, “Why just have one strategy? Why not employ a Force Multiplier, like they do in cancer therapy: Chemotherapy (often triple chemo strategy), Radiation and Surgery, aka poison/burn/slash. Or in warfare, strike by air, navy, and ground at once.”
I surmised that I would need something that would act like the osteoclasts that drive osteoporosis, where my immune system would go and remodel my calcified plaques and resorb them by taking the calcium and lipids out. There are macrophages in the heart that can do this, but they need to be incited to do so. Calcification is an overly protective mechanism in the face of continuing damage to the endothelial vessels of the heart, eye, brain to reduce the risk of rupture and subsequent death. What could do this, short of injecting osteoclasts into the heart vessels?
Fasting is one mechanism in which to induce autophagy along with utilizing our more efficient fat energy system, which less than 10% seem to have the ability to do well, as most people are glucose dependent, giving rise to a cancerous environment, as cancer cells can only use glucose for energy, but not fat.
Vitamin K2, along with HDL, might also help, as Vitamin K2 keeps calcium out of soft tissues like the arterial walls and into bone and teeth. HDL carries cholesterol from the blood to the liver.
So my Triple Strategy is:
Healing diet protocol
Exercise protocol
Fasting protocol
Thinking about how to implement my 4th strategy for the Sleep protocol.
Top 3 Heart Superfoods to Reverse Plaque
Reverse soft plaques first, then attack the more difficult seemingly impossible calcified hard plaques.
Dr. Kevin Ham
There are three types of plaque: Unstable, soft and hard.
Unstable plaques cause 70% of heart attacks, otherwise known as Low Attenuated Plaque (LAP), as they can rupture into the lumen of the artery and cause a full blockage of the artery, resulting in a heart attack. These plaques are typically smaller and rupture without warning.
Plaques that are calcified and obstructing the artery, while limiting blood flow, typically do not rupture and present warning signs like angina (chest pain) or shortness of breath on exertion.
In six months, I can reduce the volume of my soft plaque and focus heavily on this.
Here are my Top 3 Heart Superfoods that have the power to reduce soft plaques:
Pomegranate juice. Just 50 ml per day can reduce up to 36% of carotid plaques. Easily measured via CIMT ultrasound of the carotids.
High dose EPA of 4g/day. This is an omega-3 fatty acid that is important in the cell membrane of the endothelial cells, as well as reducing inflammation and helping endothelial cells produce nitric oxide, which helps expand the blood vessels. This is recognized in traditional medicine, and you can get a prescription for it.
Natto contains high amounts of Vitamin K2 and contains a significant amount of nattokinase. 6000 to 12000 FU (fibrinogen units) can reduce plaques in the carotids up to 30%. I am eating natto twice a day and also plan to supplement with nattokinase to get to 12,000 FU. Vit K2 amounts from natto twice a day are ~500 mcg.
Notables:
Red Grapefruit. Once a day. Be careful if you are taking statins or medications, as grapefruit affects the liver enzymes and can alter medication dosages.
? Vitamin C high dose plus lysine and proline. Will explain the proposed mechanisms after I do more research.
My Next Month
It’s my ‘rest two weeks’ as I return from Korea today, having done my weekly fasts and I only did strength training with weights (squats, leg extensions, leg press, bench press). I did a colonoscopy to rule out the #1 cancer, Colon cancer. No polyps. Just three diverticuli in my right colon. Whew!
Labs:
Aug 18: Exercise stress test
Aug 19: CT Heart Flow to measure blood flow obstruction in my main heart vessels to see how much my plaques affect blood flow. I assume I have a lot of natural bypasses in the form of collateral blood flow due to my decades of cycling, but this will tell me for sure.
Aug 19: CIMT to measure carotid intima-media thickness (carotid plaque in the neck)
Aug 19: Monthly lipid panel
Lifestyle Prescription:
Fast:
29 hour fast on the plane ride back home tomorrow
72h fast a week after my Sept gran Fondo
Exercise:
Train for my 140 km Gran Fondo next Saturday with a block of solid riding (490 km in 11 days including 4 rest day)
Continue 2.5 week block exercise training of 600 km Aug 18 - Sep 3 for Whistler Gran Fondo: 122 km with 2000m elevation September 6
Diet:
Add 4g EPA to my lifestyle modification
Add nattokinase supplementation
Sleep:
Try and sleep 7 hours+. Go to bed by 11:30 pm latest.
Life Questions
I have a few friends who did full-body physicals this summer. My dear friend found a small brain aneurysm and is pre-diabetic, although she seems so healthy. Another found three colon polyps, with one large one that needs a referral. Another friend had eight colonic polyps removed. I’m convinced that anyone eating the western diet of processed foods has some degree of atherosclerosis and metabolic syndrome (eg. insulin resistance that can lead to diabetes and other metabolic diseases).
What silent disease has started to take root in your body that you might be unaware of?
What baseline tests can you do to catch it early and be aware of it, especially if you are in your 40s or older?
I’ll check back in with an update on my heart journey next month. In the meantime…
Next week: The 7-Self Framework: the Transformational Journey of Self
From Self-Perception to Self-Transcendence
See you next Thursday!
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