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Nasty breakfast traps: You should avoid these delicacies in the morning
The target values for the individual types of cholesterol depend on whether someone has other illnesses such as high blood pressure or diabetes or whether they smoke, for example. “LDL cholesterol should not be above 150 mg/dl if there is a single additional risk factor for cardiovascular disease,” says Wechsler. If there are several risk factors, then the LDL cholesterol should be below 100 mg/dl.
Even if a patient severe high blood pressure the LDL cholesterol value must not exceed 100 mg/dl. If someone has already had a heart attack or is diabetic, the value should even be below 70 mg/dl. If possible, the HDL should be over 45 mg/dl in women and over 40 mg/dl in men.
Recommendation: Once a year for a cholesterol check
Around serious illnesses To prevent this, everyone should have their cholesterol levels checked once a year. “This can be done with a quick test in many, but not all pharmacies,” says Ursula Sellerberg, pharmacist and deputy press spokeswoman at the Federal Chamber of Pharmacists. If the values determined deviate from the guideline values, patients should see a doctor.
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If it turns out that a patient’s cholesterol level – and above all the “bad” cholesterol – is permanently high, the first step is to change his diet and lifestyle.
“This means that the patient eats fewer high-fat and animal products and more plant-based and low-fat foods such as vegetables, fruit and grain products,” explains Wechsler. If someone is overweight, the doctor puts them on a diet at the same time. Incidentally, ginger is a natural cholesterol-lowering agent – even small amounts a day can reduce cholesterol levels.
Genetics is more important to cholesterol levels than diet
However, a change in diet is not necessarily helpful. Professor Ulrich Laufs, cardiologist Leipzig University Hospitalis from the image quoted as follows: “Many people have an inherited hypercholesterolemia in front. Due to a genetic defect, they have difficulty absorbing cholesterol from the blood into the liver. Your cholesterol levels are rising.”
The influence of the right diet on cholesterol levels has long been overestimated. This is the opinion of many physicians today, including Professor Laufs: “Today we know that genetics is a major cause, not nutrition. However, it still plays a role for the heart and blood vessels. A healthy lifestyle with sufficient exercise and the right diet is beneficial heart attack and stroke.”
According to current estimates, LDL lowering through diet alone is relatively unlikely – the probability of success is between five and 30 percent.
The right fats: what matters when cholesterol is too high
If you still decide to change your diet, Antje Gahl from the German Society for Nutrition (DGE) gives important tips: “The focus should be on choosing the right fats: vegetable oils, margarine, nuts and oily fish are to be preferred.” According to them, it has a positive effect to consume fewer saturated fatty acids, such as those found in animal foods, and instead more unsaturated fatty acids.
Recipe: Salmon fillet in mustard-dill sauce with tomato salad
“Coconut fat, butter, cream, lard, and bacon should be used sparingly,” Gahl said, when that cholesterol too high is.
She also advises looking out for hidden fats in processed foods – they can be found in deli salads, pizzas or tarts, for example. Lower-fat variants should be preferred. In addition to changing your diet, regular exercise, little alcohol and avoiding nicotine can also help to lower your cholesterol level. Eating eggs can raise cholesterol levels significantly – read here how dangerous eggs really are for our health.
Statins: Drug used to lower cholesterol
Eight weeks after starting this type of therapy, the doctor again measures the blood lipid levels of the patient. Medication only comes into play when it turns out that the values have not improved significantly. “But that doesn’t immediately lower the cholesterol level,” explains Sellerberg. If taken regularly, it only goes down in the medium term.
how aerzteblatt.de reported, the intake of such statins (cholesterol-lowering drugs) is not always viewed uncritically. In addition to the fact that the effect only occurs with regular intake and correctly adjusted dosage, there are also some side effects such as breathing difficulties, muscle pain, diabetes, heartburn or joint pain.
Is a elevated cholesterol levels hereditary, a change in diet and lifestyle is of little use in lowering the levels. “In such a case, drugs are prescribed from the outset,” says Wechsler.
