What is the truth about Cholesterol?

Danni3ll3

You have a very similar profile to mine.

Total Cholesterol: 284.9
LDL: 191
HDL: 77.3
Triglycerides: 83.2
Ratio: 3.7

(I had to convert from the units we use in Canada to those of the US).

This is what my naturopath doctor recommended for me to do to lower my LDL even though she felt it really was unnecessary considering my other numbers, however, my medical doctor is threatening to put me on statins if I don't get it down.

1. Continue the daily walks
2. Increase my intake of vegetables (especially cruciferous veggies) and fruit
3. Make sure I get lots of soluble fiber (put fiber supplement in smoothies or drinks.)
4. Drink 2 to 3 cups of green tea daily
5. Take 2000 iu of Vitamin D daily
6. Take 800 to 1000 mg of EPA fish oils daily
7. Take 500 mg 3x per day of Inositol hexaniacinate (This one is available in health food stores but please don't take unless you check with a doctor)
8. Increase my intake of Vitamin C (I take something call Medi C Plus available in Canada. It is a combo of high Vitamin C, Lysine and Calcium)

I hope this helps.

Spokez70

Your body produces significantly more cholesterol than diet. Dietary cholesterol reduction will do nothing to decrease blood lipid cholesterol.

If you want a great primer on cholesterol, Dr. Mercola provides a great overview here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-mercola/the-cholesterol-myth-that_b_676817.html

Can anyone comment as to the validity of this article? I know Mercola is iffy at best (the recent death box / microwave oven thread comes to mind) but I have to say a lot of this makes sense to me and does ring true with my personal experience with cholesterol. My lab work was never worse than after I was a vegetarian for a year.

IronSmasher

If you want to lower your cholesterol, stop eating dietary cholesterol. It's that simple.

ahamm002

So just got my bloodwork back from the doc and my HDL is 59 and my LDL is 141 and VLDL is 18 = 218

My HDL is "in range" but my LDL is high. How do I lower my cholesterol? And what is the truth about cholesterol? Do I eat the whole egg or not? Some say yes some say no.

I'm so confused!

Don't worry about avoiding dietary cholesterol. It's more important to worry about getting enough servings of fruits and veggies in per day, and continuing to improve your body composition.

TheVimFuego

I have no idea what my numbers are and I don't care.

Blaming cholesterol (whatever variety) for heart issues is like blaming the fire brigade for fires.

The whole cholesterol thing is a huge con, if someone tried to push statins onto me I tell them to shove them up their bum.

Eat eggs, all of them, wonderful food, you can make a whole chicken with one.

(edit) Not that dietary cholesterol has any effect on blood cholesterol, as others have said. Really, there is a shedload of stuff to be more worried about than these meaningless numbers.

twilight_princess

If you want to lower your cholesterol, stop eating dietary cholesterol. It's that simple.

Its actually saturated fat that you should be concerned with if you have an issue with cholesterol. Monounsaturated fat (e.g. from plant oils and nuts) and insoluble fibre can help reduce LDL and increase HDL.

olivesoils

Nothing wrong with eating eggs they contain good cholesterol you can eat two per day without worrying.
Garlic and Olive Oil are good cholesterol lowering/controlling foods.

TheVimFuego

Nothing wrong with eating eggs they contain good cholesterol you can eat two per day without worrying.
Garlic and Olive Oil are good cholesterol lowering/controlling foods.

But it doesn't need controlling or lowering!

It's just cholesterol, it's necessary, it ain't going to kill you.

I correct myself, too little cholesterol WILL kill you.

Treat it like air, the body will work out how much it needs and adjust accordingly.

neanderthin

Your body produces FAR more cholesterol than you can get through diet. Eat the whole egg and don't worry about cholesterol.

If you're worried about cholesterol, low carbohydrate eating will put your blood lipids in good shape within a few weeks - upping HDL, decreasing the deadly VLDL, and decimating triglycerides like your body forgot how to make them.

Certainly don't worry about lowering your numbers if your VLDL and triglyceride numbers aren't unhealthy. From what I've read, lower cholesterol is associated with higher incidences of all-reason mortality.

Agreed. Our body has about 35000mg's of cholesterol at any given time with the liver producing about 1000mg's daily, so eating cholesterol isn't the problem.

Cholesterol is just cholesterol there is no bad cholesterol per se, it's the proportion and type of protein the body produces (lipoprotein) for transportation that is important. It's the small dense LDL proteins that are of concern and trigs in the blood in tandem with it's relationship with HDL proteins. If the body produces too many sdLDL and our HDL is low and trigs are high, we're in deep trouble, but if LDL is the larger more buoyant LDL and trigs are very low with high to average HDL, we're doing well.

A recent study of 231,986 hospitalizations from 541 hospitals, admission lipid levels were documented in 136,905 75% of those patients who had a heart attach with an average LDL of 104, half under 100 and with 17% under 70. Average trigs were 160 and HDL was under 40 with only 1.4% of patients with HDL over 60. This was run by the National Cholesterol Education Program and their conclusion was that LDL cholesterol guidelines are still too high and need to be lowered further. I wonder if any of the directors of NCEP have any honorariums from any drug companies that produce cholesterol lowering drugs?

Of course the 25% group had higher overall cholesterol, I think I would prefer to be in the minority in this study.

newjourney2015

So just got my bloodwork back from the doc and my HDL is 59 and my LDL is 141 and VLDL is 18 = 218

My HDL is "in range" but my LDL is high. How do I lower my cholesterol? And what is the truth about cholesterol? Do I eat the whole egg or not? Some say yes some say no.

I'm so confused!

Didn't post that my triglyceride is 89.

All levels are "in-range" except LDL. Hmmmm - freaking out about nothing? Just a little diet tweeking and I should be good. I will NOT take statins! I am already on HBP meds and they tell me it's genetic so there's nothing I can do with diet and excercise. Doesn't mean I'm not going to continue to try!

newjourney2015

If you want to lower your cholesterol, stop eating dietary cholesterol. It's that simple.

Your body produces significantly more cholesterol than diet. Dietary cholesterol reduction will do nothing to decrease blood lipid cholesterol.

If you want a great primer on cholesterol, Dr. Mercola provides a great overview here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-mercola/the-cholesterol-myth-that_b_676817.html

Wow! What an eye opening article! Thanks! This does answer some questions and raises some questions as well.

AlabasterVerve

Peter Attia did a great series of blog posts on cholesterol at The Eating Academy that's pretty comprehensive. It might answer any of the questions you still have:

http://eatingacademy.com/category/cholesterol-2

ETA:
Dr. Briffa blogs about cholesterol a lot as well:

http://www.drbriffa.com/category/cholesterol-and-statins/

Bakkasan

The truth is everyone is different. I can eat 6 eggs a day and my cholesterol remains low(120) as long as I eat low carb. I go off low carb and mine shoots up to 250-300.

/In before low carb sucks

n0ob

The truth is everyone is different. I can eat 6 eggs a day and my cholesterol remains low(120) as long as I eat low carb. I go off low carb and mine shoots up to 250-300.

/In before low carb sucks

low carb sucks...lol, pizza and beer FTW.

Bakkasan

Damn I do love my pizza...