High cholesterol level is the main cause of producing heart diseases. Today many people suffer from heart diseases because they don’t keep in mind various factors which affect the strength of your heart. High cholesterol in body could be due to genetic factors, diet or many other factors. You can control your cholesterol better if you are aware of these factors. Here is a list of these factors.
Factors affecting Cholesterol Level:
- Diet:
Eating foods which contain high amount of saturated fat raises the level of cholesterol in your body. Saturated fats are mostly found in foods that come from animals like beef, veal, pork, milk, butter, cheese and eggs. Also foods that contain a lot of palm oil, coconut oil or cocoa butter are high in saturated fats. Your job should be to avoid all these foods to maintain the level of cholesterol.
- Activity:
Lack of exercise or a sedentary lifestyle is a great factor that affects your cholesterol. It raises the level of bad cholesterol called LDL and decreases the level of good cholesterol called HDL. So don’t stick to your bad or couch and go outside.
- Excess Weight:
A protruding belly is not good for your health in any way. Besides causing many other health related problems it also increases triglycerides and decreases HDL in the body. So alleviating that belly is going to help you a lot.
- Overall Health:
An annual physical checkup is important for ensuring complete wellness. Also don’t forget to get details from your doctors about heart disease risks. Some diseases like diabetes increase the risk of heart diseases.
- Age and Gender:
The cholesterol level in human body begins to rise after an age of 20. In men the cholesterol level becomes fairly high as they reach their fifties. In women the cholesterol level remains low in comparison to men until menopause and after that it rises with same pace as in men.
- Smoking:
Perhaps you are hearing this thousandth time, smoking is injurious for your health and it also reduces level of cholesterol in body. So it is better for you to quit smoking.
- Family History:
You are at a higher risk of having high cholesterol if your family members also have high cholesterol. So it could be a genetically transferred problem also.
Thus all these factors should be kept in mind to reduce the risk of heart diseases.
