4 replies to this topic

[Scubatooth]

I swear this isnt a joke, but this comes out of the whacky wild world of sports. I thought

Back in november I had a health screening for a Life Insurance policy (dont anyone get any ideas ) and got the results this week for it and it looks like i need to work on my cholesterol a little. my total cholesterol is 97 no thats not a misprint either (and triglycerides were 94) so that is all good, only problem is my HDL (good cholesterol) is 28 when it needs to be in the 35-80 range. I thought low cholesterol was a good thing but a low HDL level increases the probability of heart disease.

I know that losing weight will help with raising it (how Idunno), but what are some other ways out there to bring the HDL level up.

Tooth

[pmarie]

Exercise, diet and exercise. In the Cardiology office that I work in we try very hard to get patients that are within a certain range to try diet and exercise modification prior to any pharmaceutical therapies being introduced. Of course most of the time we are trying to elevate the good and decrease the bad....but even us employees watch our levels and try to "practice what we preach."

[Scubatooth]

Exercise, diet and exercise. In the Cardiology office that I work in we try very hard to get patients that are within a certain range to try diet and exercise modification prior to any pharmaceutical therapies being introduced. Of course most of the time we are trying to elevate the good and decrease the bad....but even us employees watch our levels and try to "practice what we preach."

I know that and have been working on it (after these labs were drawn it took them 90days to get me the results) but I was wondering if there were some natural supplements or other items I can add to the diet and exercise (as I can tolerate right now).

Dan

[Indy Brad]

The bad news is what you already have seen....the single most effective way to raise HDL is exercise, exercise and more exercise. That is also the good news, assuming you are not regularly training for the next triathlon.

If you are already spending more than 4 hours a week in a gym, you probably are not going to get much more effect, however, if you are not an exercise freak, 30 min on a stair stepper and 30 minutes swimming laps 3-5 times per week should make considerable difference on HDL and will likely drop your blood pressure 5mm of mercury too.

[Wakemaker]

How do you raise your cholesterol (HDL that is)

Hi Tooth!

You have asked a question I have never encountered before. You might want to check the nutrients you are getting in your regular staple. My guess is that you are getting lots of wholesome grains. Something odd? Grains can have a lot of calories depending on how they are served.

There may be more. I recall learning our bodies make some cholesterol on their own and when a person decreases bad cholesterol, natural processes can generate more. So a few of us end up in a constant fight with reduction.

Also, if you fiddle with your diet to increase cholesterol you may put your hormones in flux. I'd keep a log for a few months to ensure you can get back to where you started if things go South.