However, it must be remembered that the Mediterranean diet is not just a diet, it also includes a number of lifestyle factors such as, increased physical activity and smoking cessation, all of which have also been shown to be important to reduce the risk of heart disease. Research around the Mediterranean diet has shown that people following this approach have a reduced risk of developing conditions such as diabetes, high blood pressure and raised cholesterol, all of which are all risk factors for heart disease. What steps can you take to keep your cholesterol at a healthy level?Ī cardio-protective Mediterranean diet is the first line dietary approach for the prevention of heart disease and stroke. These include getting older, gender, ethnic background, familial hypercholesterolaemia (a genetic condition meaning that you are born with a high level of cholesterol in your blood and have no control over it), having an underactive thyroid or kidney or liver disease. A number of other things which you have no control over can cause high cholesterol.Having a higher weight, holding weight around your middle area or having diabetes increase your risk of having high cholesterol.Smoking can lead to the build-up of tar in your arteries which makes it easier for cholesterol to stick to your artery walls.As long as you take care of the things you can control, you’ll help lower your risk.
Some things you can control like lifestyle habits, others you can’t. Triglycerides can also contribute to the narrowing of the artery walls, increasing your risk of heart disease.Īnyone can get high cholesterol, and it can be caused by many different things. Triglycerides can be raised in diabetes, obesity, kidney disease, with an underactive thyroid and too much alcohol. eating a lot of sugary processed foods can make you more likely to have a high triglyceride level). Triglyceride is another type of fat in our blood and it is also affected by what we eat and drink (e.g. If this happens in the arteries that carry blood to your brain it can lead to a stroke. If the arteries that carry blood to your heart get damaged and blocked, it can lead to a heart attack.
This narrowing reduces the blood supply to your heart and brain. LDL (Low density lipoproteins) is known as ‘bad’ cholesterol because it sticks to the artery walls forming a fatty plaque and causes narrowing of the arteries. HDL cholesterol has been associated with a reduced risk of coronary heart disease. HDL (high-density lipoprotein) is known as ‘good’ cholesterol because it can help keep bad cholesterol in check by transporting it away from the arteries to the liver, where it is broken down and removed from the body. There are two main types of cholesterol: HDL and LDL Making small changes now can make a big difference to your life now and in the future, especially if you already have heart disease or a family history of it. Having high cholesterol affects people of all ages. It makes it harder for blood to flow through, which can lead to a stroke or heart attack. This can lead to fatty material building up – in a process called atherosclerosis. Too much LDL cholesterol can be harmful because it sticks to the inside walls of your arteries. If your total cholesterol is high, it can mean that you have a lot of LDL (bad) cholesterol in your blood.
0 kommentar(er)
