Tuesday, March 19, 2024

7 Worst Cholesterol Culprits…

January 8, 2012 by  
Filed under Health, News, Opinion, Weekly Columns

Like
Like Love Haha Wow Sad Angry

(ThyBlackMan.com) Do you have high cholesterol? You’re not alone—so do about 100 million other Americans. High cholesterol comes from a variety of sources, including your family history and what you eat. Here is a visual journey through the most common causes.

Your diet

Eating too much saturated fat (like the kind found in this classic breakfast) can cause high cholesterol. You will find this unhealthy fat in foods that come from animals. Beef, pork, veal, milk, eggs, butter, and cheese contain saturated fat. Packaged foods that contain coconut oil, palm oil, or cocoa  butter may have a lot of saturated fat. You will also find saturated fat in stick margarine, vegetable shortening, and most cookies, crackers, chips, and other snacks.

Your weight

Your beer belly isn’t just bad for your social life. Being overweight may increase triglycerides and decrease HDL, or good cholesterol. Losing that gut can go a long way toward improving that body, too.

Your activity level

Lack of physical activity may increase LDL, or bad cholesterol, and decrease HDL, or good cholesterol. So get moving!

Your age and gender

After you reach age 20, your cholesterol levels naturally begin to rise. In men, cholesterol levels generally level off after age 50. In women, cholesterol levels stay fairly low until menopause, after which they rise to about the same level as in men.

Your overall health

Don’t skip your annual physical, and be sure to have your doc explain your heart disease risk. Having certain diseases, such as diabetes or hypothyroidism, may cause high cholesterol.

Your family history

If family members have high cholesterol, you may also.

Cigarette smoking

Smoking can lower your good cholesterol. And it can kill you. So why not just go ahead and quit?

Written By  Marcus Williams

 


Comments

3 Responses to “7 Worst Cholesterol Culprits…”
  1. Alan Watson says:

    With all due respect, this article about cholesterol contains a lot of errors repeating misinformation handed down from the federal government for the past 30 or more years. (1) Cholesterol in food has no relationship to cholesterol in blood – they are two completely different things. As an example, eating eggs every day – a food containing cholesterol – does not elevate blood levels. (2) Natural saturated fat in food like beef only promotes an increase in protective HDL cholesterol. (3) Excess sugar – not natural fat – is converted by the body into cholesterol. The writer David Brown is right – it’s time to reverse the Anti-Saturated fat campaign.

  2. David Brown says:

    In nearly 35 years of researching the saturated fat controversy I have never found evidence that there is evidence that saturated fats cause arteries to clog. The research indicates that saturated fats are benign over a wide range of intakes as long as they are consumed in the context of adequate supportive nutrition. http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-05/bu-dcd051811.php In fact, any effects saturated fats may have on cholesterol should be regarded as physiological, not pathological, and likely beneficial. http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-05/tau-cn050511.php

    It’s time to reverse the Anti-saturated fat Campaign. http://www.foodandbeveragepeople.com/cm/news/saturated_fats and publicize the omega-6 hazard http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evolutionary-psychiatry/201103/your-brain-omega-3

  3. Giosincere says:

    Peace and thanks. I want to share that you don’t have to be overweight to have high cholesterol. At 18, I had super high cholesterol and I was only 98 lbs.

Speak Your Mind

Tell us what you're thinking...
and oh, if you want a pic to show with your comment, go get a gravatar!