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| |  Lower Your Cholesterol Level and Take Charge of Your Heart's Health SAN DIEGO, Sept. 9, 1996 -- How high is your blood cholesterol level? Do you know? The amount of cholesterol in the blood plays an important part in deciding a person's chance of getting coronary heart disease, the number one killer of men and women in the U.S. The higher your level, the greater your risk. "As a cardiologist, it's frustrating to me to realize that many of the people I see could have done a lot to prevent the need for treatment, or even surgery, in the first place," said Daniel Collins, MD, of the Cardiology department at Kaiser Permanente. "Many of the causes and risk factors for heart disease are within the patient's power to manage." Maintaining an appropriate blood cholesterol level is one of the things you can do something about," explains Dr. Collins. When you have too much cholesterol in your blood, the excess builds up on the walls of the arteries leading to the heart. This buildup is the most common cause of heart disease which is why almost everyone can benefit from lowering his or her blood cholesterol. Many people have had success in lowering their cholesterol levels -- from 1978 to 1990, the average level in the U.S. dropped from 213 mg/dL to 205 mg/dL, according to the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health. "To avoid finding yourself in a heart specialists' office, or worse, in the heart surgeon's operating room," says Dr. Collins, "do your best to keep your total blood cholesterol under 240, and better yet, under 200." Here's what you can do: -- Choose foods low in saturated fat -- it raises your blood cholesterol more than anything else. Foods high in saturated fats include butter and heavily "marbled" meats. Read the labels on commercially prepared foods to see what the fat content is. -- Choose foods low in total fat. When you do eat fat, substitute unsaturated fat -- either polyunsaturated (like corn, cottonseed, safflower, sunflower and vegetable oils) or monounsaturated (olive oil, peanut oil). -- Eat foods high in starch and fiber. Breads, cereals, pasta, grains, fruits and vegetables are low in saturated fat and cholesterol, as well as lower in calories. -- Limit your cholesterol intake. Dietary cholesterol can raise blood cholesterol, although usually not as much as saturated fat. It can be found only in foods that comes from animals, such as meat and eggs. -- Be more physically active. Being active can actually raise HDL (the "good" cholesterol) and lower LDL (the "bad" one). Activity also helps you lose weight, lower your blood pressure, reduce stress and improve the fitness of your heart. -- Keep your weight at the right level for you. If you are overweight, losing even a little weight can help to LDL-cholesterol and raise HDL-cholesterol. Wondering what else you can do to lower your risk of heart disease? Following are the other heart disease risk factors you can do something about: -- Cigarette smoking -- Quit -- High blood pressure -- Improve your physical activity and diet -- Diabetes -- Manage it and care for yourself responsibly -- Obesity/overweight -- Improve your diet and bring your weight down -- Physical inactivity -- Start a regular exercise program practice Kaiser Permanente Southern California Region is a nonprofit, pre-paid group health maintenance organization (HMO) serving 2.3 million members from Bakersfield to San Diego. The Region has approximately 26,000 employees, 3,000 physicians and is made up of 10 major medical centers and about 100 medical offices.
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