Lowering High Cholesterol Level May Not Be Good Enough, Why?

Cholesterol is a fatty substance found in our bloodstream and the outer lining of our cells. It is an important component of our overall health because it is needed for cell membranes formation, and many biological and chemical functions of our body.

Cholesterol is transported around in our body by special carriers called lipoproteins. The two most important ones are the low-density lipoprotein (LDL) and high-density lipoprotein (HDL).

It is believed that HDL tends to carry cholesterol away from the arteries and back to the liver and prevent plaques built-up in the arteries, while LDL tends to build up plaques that can slowly clog arteries leading to atherosclerosis.

A condition called hypercholesterolemia, which is the abnormal high level of cholesterol in the blood should be taken seriously as it is a major risk factor of you getting a stroke, heart attack and developing coronary heart disease.

What happens till now is that most people are concerned with total cholesterol level and treating high LDL level. There are various ways available to lower high cholesterol level such as the all- natural Mangano method and cholesterol lowering drugs.

A recent study done by researchers from the Indiana University School of Medicine and pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline, Inc found that it is more important to have a high level of HDL-the good cholesterol, than having a low level of LDL. Therefore, it is not good enough to just lower LDL which may lower the total cholesterol level and hide a low HDL level.

After carefully looking into the various heart disease risk factors affecting almost 7,000 patients, mainly African Americans, women, smokers and overweight people, The researchers found the strongest predictor of future heart attack was previous heart disease; age was the second strongest predictor and the third strongest predictor was HDL level.

This study was repeated with stroke as the outcome rather than heart disease, and the results were the same: HDL cholesterol was a strong predictor of stroke, and the LDL cholesterol was not.

The result clearly shown that having more good cholesterol (HDL) is more important than having less bad cholesterol (LDL).

As Dr. Tierney puts it, “Having a high total cholesterol reading may not be bad, in fact it may be good if it's the HDL component which is high. Conversely, a low total cholesterol reading, is not necessarily good because it can hide a low HDL level,”

Hopefully with the result of this study, physicians and patients should pay closer attention to HDL cholesterol than solely focusing on lowering LDL or total cholesterol level.

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