Cholesterol Misconceptions
Both plants and animals have ’sterols’ though cholesterol is only derived from animal products - meat, eggs and milk.
Don’t confuse the distinction between dietary and blood cholesterol. “Good” cholesterol is not a type of cholesterol found in food but refers to the way the body transports cholestserol.
A recent incorrect comment comes to mind, “Eggs Yolks have Good cholesterol”. This needs correcting, which brings me to this…
‘Good’ and ‘Bad’ cholesterol are actually terms for the lipoproteins or fats within your body that carry the cholesterol. These lipoproteins simply house the cholesterol think of them as the surrounding the cholesterol.
The reference is specifically to the amount of these lipoproteins that carry the cholesterol in and out of the blood stream within the human body. And the good or bad of it is in it funtion, going in the blood or coming out.
“Good cholesterol” are actually HDL’s “High Density Lipoprotein” representing the lipids that house the cholesterol on its way out of your blood and bad Cholesterol or LDL’s “Low Density Lipoprotein” on the way in. The ratio of these 2 is how cholesterol is measured not by the actual amount of the cholesterol in the body.
Cholesterol is needed by the body for the manufacture of bile, hormones etc. and is not a villan by any means. Your body can manufature as much cholesterol as needed unless you have a rare condition. It is proven that too much in the blood can cause buildup in arteries walls that can lead to stroke and heart attack amongst other things.
In my personal experience asking my doctor to have my cholesterol checked was one of the most important decisions I have ever made.
February 7, 2008 at 12:02 am
Read Anthony Calpo’s book, "The Great Cholesterol Con". he pretty much did his research, tons of research, sited studies, etc, on cholesterol and there is no proof/scientific fact/medical study that proves that cholesterol will casue CHD such as stroke, heart attack, etc.
in fact, in this book, there are tons of studies that prove that the lower your cholesterol serum levels are, the higher your chances of dying are! all the studies show that actually the higher your cholesterol, the more happier and longevity of your life is.
all this crap about the higher your cholesterol the more likely you are of having some sort of CHD is bull! that’s why it is called the "lipid HYPOTHESIS" it’s only a hypothesis. medical doctors are just throwing an idea, a guess, out there and we as a society have been feeding off it because they are supposably our doctors and no more.
the studies also show/prove that the lower your cholesterol level is the more severe signs of moodiness, irritability, suicidal, homicidal, etc increase.
if you think about, cholesterol has a phospholipid bilayer where water cant penatrate. there are high amounts of cholesterol located in your brain, spinal cord and liver. this bilayer helps protect the importance of your central nervous system. now if you lower your cholesterol by diet or statin drugs then you are decreasing you cholesterol by your brain and spinal cord. by doing that you are asking for severe side affects and you just put yourself in a bad situation.
enough of me talking about cholesterol. i suggest you read his book before you start telling people about cholesterol and before you start lowering you cholesterol.
February 7, 2008 at 11:10 am
I appreciate the criticism, though the main point to my blog is to clear the air on the misconceptions of LDL and HDL. I noticed a good many were confusing dietary cholesterol with Lipoproteins in the blood. Though regarding your response, I will say, simply put, higher choletserol levels are one of many potential factors contributing toward Coronary Heart Disease and lowering cholesterol is not the end all be all per se. Though, specific to cholsterol, issue is with elevated levels and not cholesterol in of itself, but high higher than normal levels. Obviously without it or severely low amounts in the blood, humans could not survive. Though the absolute majority of us produce more than enough cholesterol within our own bodies, it is a rare condition if one does not. This makes dietary cholesterol simply not needed. Again, the CHD issue regarding cholesterol is with hyperlipodemia in the blood. I should also add, having seen quite a few medical studies directly linking higher cholesterol levels with Coronary Heart Disease, I have also seen, first hand multiple people struggle with heart disease and heart attacks, specifically 2 of said people have died premature (42 and 62 years old respectively) and all of which suffer from elevated cholesterol. On the contrast, as i do discuss cholesterol levels with many, some well into their seventies, eighties and even nineties, all of which have low or very cholesterol levels. With the right amount of exposure it is easy to see the correlation of these facts.