Can Certain Diets Lower Your Cholesterol?

By now, most people realize that to decrease the risk of some serious illnesses, like heart disease, they must keep their cholesterol levels in check. Although today there are many prescription drugs available, diets lower cholesterol just as effectively. However, there are factors that can work against you in the fight against high cholesterol.

Some of the risk factors that can increase a person's cholesterol level are genetic, amount of exercise, age, gender, and of course weight. Lower your weight is one of the best ways to help keep yourself healthy, especially when it comes to cholesterol. Losing weight is a very important step to take to controlling your cholesterol. This is especially true if you are diabetic and your triglyceride levels are high.

Altering your diet can help lead to a healthy cholesterol level. Your diet should contain as many low-fat and low-cholesterol foods as possible. Simply by reducing the amount of fat and "bad" cholesterol you take in (even a 10% - 20% reduction) will have significant benefits.

Here are some tips to help you swap out the bad cholesterol foods for good cholesterol foods:

- Replace butter, poly-unsaturated oils, and trans fat margarine with canola oil, olive oil, and plant sterol spreads - Use white wine vinegar instead of butter to keep your pan moist while cooking (this doesn't change the taste but reduces overall cholesterol) - Replace eggs with cholesterol-free egg substitutes* *There has been a lot a debate over the egg and it's affect on cholesterol. For now, let's keep the whole egg out.

Make sure that the changes in your diet are not just for weight loss. Changing your diet just for that can actually increase your cholesterol levels. The goal is to have a diet that lowers cholesterol and lowers overall weight. An example of a bad change is to eat a low-fat but high carbohydrate diet.

Why is the high-carb diet bad? The body produces cholesterol as part of its normal function. The body also has a "backup plan" in case you go into what's known as "starvation mode". Your liver produces cholesterol. The body, when taking in too much carbohydrates, will produce excess insulin (a very bad thing especially for diabetics). Your liver, in response, will siphon blood sugar to help produce cholesterol and triglycerides (used for fat storage and energy production). You now have a higher level of "bad" cholesterol and have done the opposite of what you've set out to do (lower your cholesterol).

You shouldn't be avoiding cholesterol altogether. In fact, your body requires certain levels of the good cholesterol (HDL) in order to maintain a healthy balance. Your body (specifically your liver) only makes about 75% of the cholesterol that your body requires. So where does the other 25% come from? You guessed it, the food you eat! By reducing the amount of good cholesterol you take in (as part of reducing your overall cholesterol intake), you will send your metabolism into that "famine" mode - sending your liver in to an overproduction-of-cholesterol mode. To get back on track, you need to start to take in normal levels of good cholesterol.

As you can see, there are simple ways to "tweak" your diet to swap bad cholesterol for good cholesterol. You have to think about what you're taking in and how your body will react to it. Diets do lower cholesterol levels, you just have to be smart about it.

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