Keeping your cholesterol levels at a healthy range is essential for your heart health. Find out how to tell if you have high cholesterol.
While cholesterol is essential for some of your body’s functions, too much can put your heart health at risk. Moreover, high cholesterol does not actually cause any symptoms, so a screening is the only way to know if you have the condition. The following is an overview of high cholesterol, how doctors detect it, and what you can do about it.
High Cholesterol Explained
The body needs cholesterol to help build cells and tissues, help with hormone production, aid bile production in the liver, and more. The liver makes all the cholesterol the body needs to perform its essential functions. However, there is another source of cholesterol that can lead to high levels: your diet.
Depending on the food you eat, you can increase your “bad” cholesterol (LDL) and triglycerides while lowering your “good” cholesterol (HDL). When you have too much LDL cholesterol, it can build up in your arteries as plaque and lead to stroke, coronary artery disease, and a heart attack.
Diagnosing High Cholesterol
Since it doesn’t present any symptoms, you’ll need to undergo a cholesterol screening to determine if your levels are too high. The screening is a simple blood test in which a healthcare professional will take a sample of blood from your arm and then send it to a lab for analysis. Results will show your levels of LDL cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, triglycerides, and total cholesterol.
While diet plays a key factor in high LDL cholesterol levels, there are other possible causes. These include a lack of exercise, obesity, smoking, genetics, underlying medical conditions, and medications that lower HDL levels. There are various risk factors that can increase the likelihood of developing high cholesterol. To help manage your cholesterol, it’s important to focus on the ones you can control.
Lowering Cholesterol Levels
If you want to lower your levels and prevent them from increasing, then you need to focus on developing healthy lifestyle habits. For example, you should make sure you’re eating a healthy diet that limits saturated fat and has no trans fat. You should also exercise on a regular basis, which will help improve circulation and maintain a moderate weight.
In addition, you should quit unhealthy habits like smoking or eating fried foods while also finding healthy ways to manage your stress. Lastly, you can take supplements like L-arginine Plus to give you an extra health boost. Its ingredients promote cholesterol, blood pressure, and overall heart health. If you want to effectively support your cholesterol health, then you need to develop healthy lifestyle habits and take L-arginine Plus.