Biggest Loser - Weight loss blog

High Cholesterol Treatments

The main goal for treating high cholesterol is to lower the LDL levels enough to reduce the risk of developing heart disease. The higher the risk, the lower the LDL goal must be. There are two main ways to treat high cholesterol:

Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes (TLC):
This includes a cholesterol-lowering diet, physical activity, and weight management. TLC is meant for anyone who has elevated LDL levels. TLC is a set of things that a person has to follow in order to achieve the targeted low levels of LDL cholesterol. TLC consists of:

The TLC Diet: This diet consists of a low-saturated-fat, low-cholesterol eating plan that begets less than:

• 7% of calories from saturated fat
• 200mg of dietary cholesterol per day

This diet recommends only limited calories for desirable weight maintenance and avoiding weight gain. LDL levels can also be lowed by increasing the amount of soluble fiber in the diet. Certain food products that contain plant stanols or plant sterols can also be added to the TLC diet to boost its LDL-lowering power.

Weight Management: Weight loss can also help lower LDL levels and this is especially important for those with a cluster of risk factors that include high triglyceride and/or low HDL levels and being overweight with a large waist circumference (more than 40 inches for men and more than 35 inches for women).

Physical Activity: Regular physical activity is recommended for everyone. It can help raise HDL levels and lower LDL levels. This is especially important for those people who have high triglyceride and/or low HDL levels and are overweight with a large waist measurement.

Drug Treatment: Cholesterol-lowering drugs are used in combination with TLC treatment to achieve positive results.

Any drug treatment to lower cholesterol is best combined with lifestyle changes to achieve positive and long-term results. This will help keep you on low doses of medicine. Several cholesterol lowering drug treatments include:

• Statins: These drugs, including Crestor, effectively lower LDL levels and are safe for most people
• Bile acid sequestrates: Also help lower LDL levels and can be used alone or in combination with statin drugs
• Nicotinic acid: Helps lower LDL levels and triglycerides while raising HDL levels
• Fibric acids: Helps lower LDL levels somewhat but are used mainly to treat high triglyceride and low HDL levels
• Cholesterol absorption inhibitors: helps lower LDL levels and can be used alone or in combination with statin drugs

Your doctor is the best person to help decide which type of drug is best for you.

To further reduce high cholesterol you must control other risk factors like:

• High blood pressure
• Stress
• Smoking

Lowering cholesterol levels brings on certain benefits:

• For every one percent fall in blood cholesterol levels, you reduce your risk for heart disease by two percent
• Even in patients with heart disease, lowering cholesterol levels will significantly reduce the risk for death and disability
• As blood cholesterol exceeds 220 ml/dl (milligrams per deciliter), risk for heart disease increases at a more rapid rate
• Blood cholesterol levels must be measured at least once every five years in all adults