Numbness In The Body Parts
If you are constantly experiencing numbness in your body parts, then high cholesterol can be responsible for that. However, other causes can also be responsible for numbness and swelling.
When bad cholesterol appears high in your body, it affects blood circulation and prevents healthy nutrients from reaching the body. The lack of proper oxygen is also a cause of swelling and unusual numbness.
Can I Eat Eggs If I Have High Cholesterol
When fat accumulates excessively on the walls of our arteries and in our blood, it is said that we suffer from high cholesterol . This condition has become a common problem today, triggered mainly by the increase in obesity and by eating an inadequate and unhealthy diet.
Reducing cholesterol to normal values is very important, since the high presence of lipids in the arteries can cause them to harden, increasing the risk of suffering from heart disease. Diet is the best ally to achieve this, but sometimes we have doubts about certain foods, do you wonder if you can eat eggs if you have high cholesterol ? In this FastlyHealarticle we answer it.
Index
Always Check The Ingredient List
Claims can be sneaky, but ingredient list will list out the true contents of what is actually in the food or drink product.
The ingredient list shows the ingredients used in the largest to the smallest amount by weight. The ingredient list is especially useful to check if the product contains trans fat.
For instance, some manufacturers may claim trans fat free on its packaging but if you see vegetable fat, lard, margarine, shortening, hydrogenated, partially hydrogenated vegetable oil in the ingredient list, youll be sure that these ingredients will still cause your arteries to clog as trans fat do.
Food containing trans fat is found in many processed and ultra-processed items such as 3-in-1 beverages, creamy and cheesy foods, fried foods, snack foods, baked goods such as pastries, cakes and cookies, products made with vegetable shortening, hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oils, and margarine. Limit these products.
Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics
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How To Measure Cholesterol
The British Heart Foundation recommends all adults have a cholesterol check at any age, even if they feel completely well.
It should be repeated every five years or more often if the test was abnormal.
Your GP might suggest having a test if they think your cholesterol level could be high as a result of your age, weight or another condition such as high blood pressure or diabetes.
Although testing the over 40s age group may seem a priority, Dr Lee said it is important to test young adults.
She explained: One in 250 of the UK population will have familial hypercholesterolaemia a genetic condition that results in high cholesterol levels .
This needs to be diagnosed at a young age and treated appropriately to stop you from developing heart disease at a young age.
If you have close relatives who have had heart disease at a young age, this should alert you to having a medical check-up and a cholesterol test because a close family history is an important risk factor for heart disease.
If its time to get a cholesterol test, you can ask your GP, pharmacist or make an appointment for your free NHS health check .
There are two ways of having a cholesterol blood test – from the arm or from the finger.
If you get blood taken from your arm with a needle, this is then sent to a lab to check your cholesterol level and you should get the result in a few days.
You might be asked not to eat anything for up to 12 hours before the test, but this is not always needed
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Ldl Cholesterol Or Bad Cholesterol
Low-density lipoprotein is often called bad cholesterol. It carries cholesterol to your arteries. If your levels of LDL cholesterol are too high, it can build up on the walls of your arteries.
The buildup is also known as cholesterol plaque. This plaque can narrow your arteries, limit your blood flow, and raise your risk of blood clots. If a blood clot blocks an artery in your heart or brain, it can cause a heart attack or stroke.
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Triglycerides A Different Type Of Lipid
Triglycerides are another type of lipid. Theyre different from cholesterol. While your body uses cholesterol to build cells and certain hormones, it uses triglycerides as a source of energy.
When you eat more calories than your body can use right away, it converts those calories into triglycerides. It stores triglycerides in your fat cells. It also uses lipoproteins to circulate triglycerides through your bloodstream.
If you regularly eat more calories than your body can use, your triglyceride levels can get high. This may raise your risk of several health problems, including heart disease and stroke.
Your doctor can use a simple blood test to measure your triglyceride level, as well as your cholesterol levels. Learn how to get your triglyceride level tested.
Rapid Or Pounding Beating Of The Heart
Most of the time, heart palpitations are harmless. They are often experienced after exercising or engaging in intense physical activities. Sometimes they are due to anxiety, stress and intake of certain drugs. However, palpitations may also indicate problems concerning the cardiovascular system, and having high cholesterol levels is one of them. Its undeniable that clogging of the blood vessels due to cholesterol can leave your heart working harder.
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Easy Guide To Understanding Food Labels When You Have High Cholesterol
Diet is an area that significantly impact your blood cholesterol. A nutritionally balanced diet while keeping minimal intake of saturated fat, trans fat and cholesterol is recommended for all. Generally, people eat enough of these and for some, even too much.
Consuming a diet that has too much saturated fat and trans fat increase your risk of chronic diseases like heart disease, high cholesterol and some cancers.
Food labels tell you what is in the food and drinks you are consuming. Every packaged and processed product should have a food label to help you determine its nutrition content. The food labels can help you sieve through misleading claims, shop faster and make better food choices to lower your cholesterol levels. Today, some restaurants even have nutrition information available on their menus.
How To Control High Cholesterol
As lifestyle factors too are the contributing causes of high cholesterol, it is necessary to plan a healthy lifestyle. It is very essential to have brisk walking, swimming, bicycling, jogging, and other types of physical exercises that can help you to reduce the high cholesterol level. Apart from proper medicine, it is very important to control your diet and quit smoking. All these measures will certainly help you to reduce the cholesterol level. Different types of high cholesterol can determine the exact treatment that needs to be given. There are several medicines and their combinations available, hence following medical advice is important. The cholesterol levels can be lowered drastically in if you follow a healthy lifestyle and a healthy dietary habit. It is essential to incorporate exercises in the daily routine and quit habits like smoking, eating junk and fried foods to get your cholesterol down.
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How To Know If You Have High Cholesterol
In most cases high cholesterol does not show any symptoms. For some, high cholesterol can present with other complaints or other medical conditions that usually coexist with high cholesterol. When a person suffers from high cholesterol other problems like high blood pressure, chest pain, angina, stroke etc. can be experienced. Apart from that, you may also feel pain in legs while walking. This may happen because of circulatory problems where the arteries may get blocked and it becomes unable to send blood to the legs, causing pain while walking. The most precise way to know if you have high cholesterol is getting the blood tests done for cholesterol. It is advisable to get the cholesterol levels checked at regular intervals as a preventive measure and for those under treatment or with greater risks.
Causes Of High Cholesterol & How To Know If You Have High Cholesterol
Cholesterol is very essential for our body since it is needed to produce hormones, vitamin D and other very essential substance that generally help in digesting the food that we eat. However, too much of cholesterol is also not good for our health as it has many negative impacts on our body. It is important to know the causes of high cholesterol to take necessary action. It is also necessary to know if you have high cholesterol, by doing regular blood tests, so that timely treatment can be planned.
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Cholesterol Causes Heart Attack And Stroke
According to experts, cholesterol is a lipid, which our body needs to function properly. It is a fat-like substance, which keeps circulating in the body through the blood arteries. Due to not being soluble in water, cholesterol is carried to different parts of the body through a particle called lipoprotein, which has a type of protein on its surface.
When cholesterol combines with high fat and low protein lipoproteins to form LDL, it is harmful to the body. This problem usually arises when your diet is rich in unhealthy fatty foods. LDL ie lipoprotein begins to build up in the arteries, which over time causes heart attack and stroke.
Changes In Skin And Nail Color
Due to the accumulation of cholesterol in the legs, the supply of oxygen-rich blood is not done properly. Due to which the color of the nails and skin of the feet starts changing. In this condition, the skin often becomes pale and the veins appear blue or purple. This happens because the cells do not get proper nutrition due to the lack of flow of nutrients and oxygen carried by the blood. Due to this the skin becomes tight and apart from thickening of the toe nails, their growth also slows down.
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Does High Cholesterol Mean You Have Clogged Arteries
Its clear that having high cholesterol can be harmful for your cardiovascular system because it can increase your risk of having clogged arteries . Arteries are the most common of your blood vessels where the plague buildups due to excessive cholesterol in the blood occur. Excessive amounts of cholesterol that travel through the blood can affect the blood flow inside the arteries which then eventually can make your heart work harder in pumping the blood. And if your blood flow cannot run as well as it should, there will be many serious complications that occur such as hypertension , heart disease, heart attack, and stroke.
What is the difference between HDL and LDL?
In general, cholesterol is classified by the type of particles that carry cholesterol in the blood called lipoprotein. So, lipoprotein itself is a package of protein-cholesterol. LDL and HDL are the most common kinds of cholesterol discussed when it comes to the issue of lowering the risk of heart disease.
While LDL stands for low density lipoprotein, HLD stands for high density lipoprotein. And as the name suggests, LDL is high in fatty deposits and cholesterol. On the other side, HDL is very low in cholesterol.
Overall, we can say that HDL is good cholesterol and LDL is bad cholesterol. How they work in affecting the blood flow inside arteries opposing each other. While high LDL increases the risk of creating more plague buildups on the arterys walls, HDL works in the opposite way !
Normal Cholesterol Levels By Age
The cholesterol levels that are healthiest for you can differ . Here’s what’s considered normal or high cholesterol for men and women over the age of 20:
The American Heart Association recommends that adults have their cholesterol checked every four to six years. People at risk for heart disease should have their cholesterol levels checked more frequently.
If you’re under the age of 20, normal or high cholesterol levels look a bit different:
Children between the ages of 9 and 11 should have their cholesterol checked once before puberty, according to the CDC, and then once again between the ages of 17 and 21. More screenings may be necessary for children and adolescents with diabetes or obesity, as they can be at a higher risk.
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What Are The Symptoms Of High Cholesterol In The Feet
The most dangerous thing about cholesterol is that the condition does not show any symptoms until it reaches dangerous levels and starts affecting your life. The only way to diagnose and prevent it is to have regular blood tests. When the level of cholesterol in the blood rises to dangerous levels, it starts affecting the Achilles tendon in your feet. Here we are telling you about some symptoms, on which you should pay attention.
You Experience Leg Pain While Exercising
If you experience a burning pain or feel like your legs are tired or heavy it may indicate poor blood flow to your legs, which could be related to high cholesterol. Pain may impact one or both legs, as well as any part of the leg from the calf to your buttocks. Most of the time the pain subsides with rest but then reoccurs when you do the same level of activity again, such as walking two blocks.
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Do You Have High Cholesterol
Cholesterol is a fat-like substance that is a natural and essential part of all cells in your body. It helps produce hormones, make vitamin D, provide cells with structure, and plays a role in the process of digesting fats. The liver creates all of the cholesterol that your body needs, so it is not required that you get it from foods. Foods that come from animals such as meat, cheese, and eggs all provide dietary cholesterol to the body.
There are two types of cholesterol: high-density lipoproteins and low-density lipoproteins . HDL is thought of as the good type of cholesterol because it carries cholesterol from your blood to your liver to be removed. This is helpful to the heart. LDL is the bad type of cholesterol: It causes a buildup of cholesterol in the blood, which leads to furring up of the arteries. This is called atherosclerosis and is a direct cause of heart attacks, strokes, and peripheral artery disease.
Triglycerides are a type of fat in the blood. They are separate to and different from cholesterol, but they are nearly always included in the cholesterol lab panel since they have a similar effect on your heart and overall health. Triglycerides come from eating too many calories . These extra calories are stored in the blood as triglycerides. High triglyceride levels can lead to heart disease and problems in your pancreas and liver, including fatty liver disease.
Here are the normal ranges for cholesterol and triglyceride levels in adults :
Can You Treat High Cholesterol
With proper treatment and diet and lifestyle changes you can get your cholesterol back to a healthy level. On the other hand, if high cholesterol remains untreated you could develop coronary artery disease , peripheral arterial disease and/or suffer a heart attack, stroke or transient ischemic attack . There are many secondary issues that can arise from high cholesterol, such as PAD. 20% of people with PAD suffer a nonfatal heart attack within 5 years.
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Tingling Sensation In The Hands And Feet
Having high cholesterol levels can cause various blood vessels in your body to become clogged up, and this is the reason why your health is in grave danger if your cholesterol is sky-high. Its not unlikely for you to experience tingling sensation in your hands and feet if your blood vessels are blocked by cholesterol since your peripheral nerves are not getting enough oxygen- and nutrient-rich blood for their proper functioning.
Choose Products Low In Saturated Fat Trans Fat And Cholesterol
When shopping for food, use the nutrition information panel to compare and choose products with lower fat, saturated fat and cholesterol content.
Saturated fat is a type of fat that raises your total and LDL cholesterol and risk of heart disease, so intake should be limited. The average adult should consume less than 20 grams of saturated fat per day.
Trans fat is more harmful and damaging to the arteries as it raises LDL cholesterol and lowers HDL cholesterol. Ideally, best to get 0 grams of this per day.
Keep in mind that manufacturers can list their products as 0 grams if it has less than 0.5 grams of trans fat per serving. This means that your food may contain trans-fat even if the food label says 0 gram. Therefore its important to check the ingredient list .
Cholesterol guidelines currently recommend having not more than 300 milligrams of cholesterol per day, and if you have heart disease, aim for less than 200 milligrams per day.
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Unhealthy Diet And Lifestyle
Do you eat lots of fatty foods and avoid fruits and vegetables that contain lots of fiber? Are you a smoker and do you love drinking alcohol in excessive amounts? Are you overweight and you are not exercising on a regular basis? If you answered yes to any or all of these questions, then there is a huge possibility that your cholesterol levels are already high. This is especially true is someone in your family is diagnosed by a doctor with high cholesterol.