Your Heart Needs Low Cholesterol

Having lower cholesterol is very important and by now we all know this. Age is not a factor when it comes to cholesterol as we can all have a problem here. It is also a fact that you can increase your chances of having a heart attack or stroke if your cholesterol is bad. In order to understand what this means and how to achieve it, we all need to understand a few of the key concepts and terms first. We will start with this.

Cholesterol is basically just a fat-like substance that is found throughout the body. The next thing is to know how it gets there. This is easy, you get your cholesterol through the body itself or in the foods we eat and put into it. You need to know that too much of it, however, is not healthy for the body. When your cholesterol is too high you will end up with clogged our arteries, block our hearts, and actually threaten to end our lives. Most of us have bad cholesterol cause we all love bacon and fatty foods.

There are two kinds of cholesterol that we have, which may be confusing at first. High density lipoprotein is one of them, and it is commonly known as HDL which actually needs to be high as it protects the heart from bad cholesterol. Low density lipoproteins, or LDL, and are sometimes called the bad cholesterol because it can clog arteries and kill us, is the other. We have both kinds of cholesterol in our bodies and we them need both. The balance between them is what gives us general health.

Lowering your Cholesterol

For those people who would prefer not to take prescription drugs for lowering their cholesterol, there is a more natural way. The alternative to using drugs is natural cholesterol reducers which could also be found in many whole foods. Most of us now prefer to take natural remedies such as herbs etc. today’s research show the effectiveness in getting rid of the symptoms or in reducing your chances of having a heart disease.

Natural cholesterol reducers are substances that help to lower cholesterol without having to have people tamper with it first. This means that they were not created with the use of chemicals or pesticides. If you are wondering what such things can be construed as natural, will tell you. Garlic is considered a natural reducer because it acts as an inhibitor. Fish oils with their omega-3-fatty acids are also known to reduce heart disease by at least 40%.

There is another factor that you need to consider too. For example, did you know that Cholesterol's sister problem beta-sitosterol can very effectively cut blood serum cholesterol with practically no changes at all made in your diet or exercise regimens. The spice Curcumin (an extract of a curry spice turmeric), lowers cholesterol naturally. However golgul gum resin which is from the myrrh tree reduces high cholesterol levels as well as it helps you with weight problems. These are just some natural spices that you can add to your diet.

Understanding Cholesterol Levels

More than half of the world today has high cholesterol. What this means is that every other person that you see walking down the street is at risk for some sort of heart disease. The average person doesn’t even know how their cholesterol stands because you can’t see high cholesterol. However, the stats stand for themselves when it comes to your cholesterol; you need to understand it in order to be able to deal with it. Once you get past the code, it is very easy to understand.

There are actually five different ways that you can use in order to get a complete reading on your own cholesterol levels and they are: total cholesterol levels, HDL, LDL, total/HDL ratio, LDL/HDL ratio. These measurements are actually written down to be what is desirable and what is not desirable. Measurement units for checking your cholesterol are conducted as milligrams per deciliter. It is extremely confusing if you try to look at these separately. You can talk to your doctor if you really want to understand your cholesterol levels and what, if anything, you need to do about them or how to maintain them properly.

I am going to give you the actual numbers that are involved when it comes to your cholesterol. Your overall desired level should be below 200 mg/dL, 200 to 240 for a borderline level and total risk above level 240. This is just for your overall levels. When it comes to breaking it down to each individual level, your doctor can best explain those to you.

Explaining HDL Cholesterol

When you think of your cholesterol, chances are all you care about is that it is low, but HDL levels are not the same as general cholesterol levels. It is actually just a section of your overall cholesterol when it comes to your HDL levels you actually want it to be high. HDL is not the same as cholesterol in any way. In fact your HDL levels are high density lipoproteins. We need lots of these. Their role in our body is to carry cholesterol away from the body as soon as LDL has brought it.

There are several different ways that you will want to achieve this. On the list are the excessive smoking, alcohol, body weight, exercise and medications. Let's look at the actual numbers on this. You have to remember that the smallest changes in HDL levels are significant. It would be going too far to say it is exponential, but a 1 mg/dL increase in your HDL cholesterol levels means as much as a 2 to 4 percent reduction in risk of heart disease and cardiac problems in general.

Knowing that your HDL levels need to be high is one thing. Here are the actual figures to explain. Your numbers are too low if they are at 37 mg/dL for men and at 47 mg/dL for women. The normal range for men to have is about 40 to 50 mg/dL, and for women 50 to 60 mg/dL. This is a concern as many people get these levels backward. It helps if you try to see a reasonable goal which would be to increase your HDL cholesterol levels by 10 mg/dL from whatever it is now since most of us need more than what we have