Combat High Blood Cholesterol

Your heart begins to beat while you are still in your mother's womb and it keeps ticking right until you draw your last breath. You heart – a little bundle of muscles, just the size of your fist, is the engine that keeps your blood circulating, carrying nutrients and oxygen to every cell and removing waste products away from the body.

Keeping your ticker going requires it to be well nourished. A complex system of arteries feed the heart muscles. Any impediment to the smooth flow of blood through the arteries to the heart muscle affects the capacity of this powerhouse.

LDL and HDL explained...

Cholesterol is carried in the blood by "packages" called lipoproteins. Low-density lipoprotein (LDL) and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) are the two main types of lipoprotein which carry cholesterol in our body.

• LDL transport cholesterol from the liver to other body tissues. Elevated levels could lead to fatty deposits on artery walls. As such, LDL cholesterol is commonly known as "bad" cholesterol.
• HDL transports cholesterol back to the liver for removal from the body. HDL cholesterol is thus commonly known as "good" cholesterol,

If your total and LDL cholesterol levels get too high and HDL cholesterol too low, you will be at an increased risk of getting your arteries choked from deposits of cholesterol called plaque. The narrowing of the arteries over time, if left unchecked, reduces blood flow, slowly starving the heart muscle. In critical cases, the blood flow may be completely impeded, leading to the death of the heart muscle, which then leads to a heart attack. With a stroke, blood can't flow to the brain.

Sprucing up your diet can help reduce your risk of a heart attack and stroke. Here are 4 dietary tips to help combat high blood cholesterol.

Maintain a healthy weight

"The longer your waistline, the shorter your lifeline" – is a popular adage that rings true. Research has highlighted that being overweight or obese and increasing abdominal girth triggers several biochemical changes in the body, increasing the risk of high blood cholesterol, hypertension and diabetes. All these medical conditions increase the chances of damaging arteries, clogging them up and precipitating a heart attack.

So, keep a check on your body weight. If you are overweight, eat a little less and exercise a little more, to drop off a few pounds. So, while you may not get to the ideal weight for your height very fast, even a little weight loss is helpful.

Eat less fat

We need some fat in the diet for our body to function properly. However, fat is a concentrated source of energy, so eating too much fat can provide excess calories and may lead to overweight and obesity.

Saturated fat, monounsaturated fat, polyunsaturated fat and trans fat are 4 different types of fat found in the food we eat. Fat and oil in food contain a mixture of these different types of fat. However, there is usually a higher proportion of a particular type in the mixture. For example, the major type of fat found in most nuts is monounsaturated fat, whereas the major type found in butter is saturated fat.

Be savvy about fats

We now know that different types of fat can affect your health differently. So, here is how you can make smarter choices:

a.      Limit intake of saturated fat

A diet high in saturated fat increases the level of LDL cholesterol in the body.

Animal fat is one of the main sources of saturated fat. So, when you do eat meat or poultry, get the leanest portion. Remove visible fat and poultry skin as well.

Select dairy products that are lower in fat – low fat or non-fat (skimmed) milk, yogurt and cheese are also healthier choices compared to whole or full cream varieties.

Coconut milk, coconut cream and palm-based vegetable oil are rich in saturated fat too. Go for dishes prepared without coconut cream or coconut milk, and cut down on deep-fried food too.

b.      Minimise trans fats

Trans fat is formed when vegetable oils undergo hydrogenation, which is a commercial process to harden oil for production of fats like shortening and hard margarine. Trans fat raises LDL-cholesterol and reduces HDL-cholesterol in the body.

Food containing trans fat include pastries, cakes, cookies and products made with vegetable shortening and hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oils. So, watch out for trans fat in your food. Read food labels and look out for the ingredients used.

c.       Use healthier unsaturated oils

Replacing saturated fats trans fats with unsaturated fats helps lower blood cholesterol, especially LDL-cholesterol. Here are two families of healthy unsaturated fats you should include in your diet:

·         The Monounsaturates: Some vegetable oils (e.g. olive oil, canola oil and peanut oil), most nuts (e.g. almonds, cashew nuts and hazelnuts) and avocados are great sources of monounsaturated fats. These oils tend to lower total and LDL cholesterol levels in the body. Use small amounts in cooking or to add variety to your diet.

·         The Polyunsaturates: This group of fats also provide essential fats that bring unique benefits to heart health. There are two main types of polyunsaturated fat, namely omega-3 and omega-6 fats.

§         Omega-3 fat reduces blood clotting in the arteries and protects them from hardening. Fish such as salmon, sardine, longtail shad (terubok)and Spanish mackerel (tenggiri papan) are examples of good sources of omega-3 fat

§         Omega-6 fats lowers total and LDL cholesterol levels in the blood. Good sources of omega-6 fat include vegetable oils (e.g. corn oil, soybean oil and sunflower oil) and seeds (e.g. sunflower seeds and sesame seeds).

Reduce cholesterol intake

In the diet, cholesterol is only found in food or beverages of animal origin and not plant food. Fruit, vegetables, grains and nuts do not contain any cholesterol

Our body also makes cholesterol because it is needed for health. So, eating a lot of food naturally rich in cholesterol will challenge your body to moderate the amount of cholesterol in your blood. Some lucky individuals have livers that can cut back the amount of cholesterol produced when challenged with a high cholesterol diet. However, others are not so genetically blessed and the liver continues to churn out cholesterol, adding to all the cholesterol absorbed from the diet, flooding the blood vessels with more of the plaque-building material.

Food high in cholesterol include organ meats (e.g. liver, kidney and brain) egg yolks, and shellfish. Moderate your intake of organ meats and shellfish, and have no more than 4 egg yolks per week.

Include wholegrains, fruit and vegetables

Including wholegrain food (e.g. brown rice, wholemeal bread and oats) vegetables, fruit and beans in your diet will help to lower blood cholesterol levels. Many of these food are good sources of soluble fibre, which have the ability to bind cholesterol in the gut, reducing absorption and increasing excretion. Such food are also rich in vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals which all work together to reduce the risk of heart disease.

Source : Health Promotion Board, Singapore

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