Is High Cholesterol Sabotaging Your Fitness?
Medical evidence strongly indicates that high cholesterol levels can cause narrowing of the arteries (atherosclerosis), heart attack and stroke.
This is because cholesterol can build up in the artery wall (restricting the flow of blood to your heart, brain and the rest of your body.) It can also accelerate the development of a lethal blood clot in a blood vessel anywhere in your body!
Your risk of coronary heart disease (when your heart’s blood supply is blocked or interrupted) rises as your blood’s cholesterol level increases. Other factors, such as high blood pressure, lack of exercise, a family history of high cholesterol and smoking, increase this risk even more.
There are many factors that can increase your chance of having heart problems or stroke if you have high cholesterol.
Some risk factors, such as an unhealthy diet and smoking, can be altered by making changes to your lifestyle.
Other risk factors, such as having diabetes or high blood pressure, can also be treated with medication.
Some risk factors, such as having a family history of stroke or heart disease, cannot be changed and that is why it is important for some people to be extra diligent when it comes to watching their bad habits and diet. In this case it may be all you can do to “beat the beast of cholesterol” off by taking measures to stay in control of how high your LDL levels are.
If you have inherited the condition you may be fighting an uphill battle to get your cholesterol down. If you have been diagnosed with high cholesterol then you may be looking for ways to change your diet so that you can improve your LDL to HDL ratio.
The amount of cholesterol in the blood (including both LDL and HDL) can be measured with a blood test. The test measures the ration of LDL to HDL. The bigger the difference is in the ratio between these two components the better as long as the LDL levels are quite low.
Triglycerides are the fats you use for energy and come from the fatty foods you eat. You store this fat that is not utilized in the fatty tissues of your body. Excess triglycerides in the blood also can indicate potential heart problems and an excess of cholesterol. That is why a doctor will often test your blood for “high triglycerides” as part of finding out how at risk you are for health problems as the result of having high cholesterol.