Why Is Lowering Cholesterol So Important to Your Health?

Heart disease is the number one killer of men and women in America and England. In other countries, it is a primary killer as well.

Bad cholesterol (LDL), a fat-like substance in the blood, is a major contributor to heart disease -- that is the direct answer to why lowering cholesterol is so vital to your long-term health.

Each year, more than 500,000 Americans die from heart disease and lowering cholesterol should be a priority but it appears to not be. Moreover, more than a million have heart attacks.

High cholesterol is a major culprit; cholesterol is a major risk factor to heart disease.

(A risk factor is a condition, lifestyle choice, diet, food or agent that increases your chance of procuring a disease.) Fundamentally, the higher your blood cholesterol level, the higher is your risk for developing heart disease. 

Sidebar: Before you get too far into this webpage or into this lowering cholesterol educational/informational site, I have a secret to tell. I know of a secret medicinal herb that is amazing in healing, nourishing, and helping your heart and venous structure. I know of an herb that actually emulsifies bad LDL cholesterol and triglycerides from your system. It's inexpensive too. A pound of it costs no more than $15 to $20. I've seen it as low as $1.67 per pound and it's easily found in any grocery store or health food store, although I do recommend buying it from a health food store in your local area.

Your Blood -- The River of Life

The health of your blood is your life. Excessive cholesterol accumulates on the walls of your arteries and excessive levels of cholesterol in your blood circulation is associated with the steady progression of atherosclerosis.

Atherosclerosis is the condition in which your artery wall gradually thickens as the result of a build-up of the fatty material known as cholesterol. Atherosclerosis can result in heart attacks and strokes.

Over time, this buildup causes "hardening of the arteries" so that arteries become gradually narrowed with blood flow to the heart significantly slowed down or even occluded or blocked.

Why is this so important? Because your blood carries oxygen to the heart. If enough blood and oxygen cannot reach the heart, you could suffer terrible chest pain, which would severely limit your lifestyle choices.

If your blood supply to a section or even a portiion of your heart is completely cut off by a arterial blockage, the result is a heart attack, which of course could mean death.

What is the cause of high cholesterol? Medical science and alternative medicine affirms the diet is mostly to blame. A diet high in animal fat is a verifiable risk factor.

There's a problem with high cholesterol symptoms -- there really aren't any. Consequently, most people are completely unaware their cholesterol is too high.

As there are no obvious symptoms, it's vital to know what your cholesterol numbers are. If you conscientiously check your cholesterol, you can severely limit the risk for heart attacks, stroke and developing heart disease.

Below are a few grids that showcases the cholesterol levels and their commensurate health risk to you.

*The rating system the government has established rates your cholesterol levels in measurements in milligrams (mg) of cholesterol per deciliter (dL) of blood.

As you may remember, it's the LDL (low-density lipoprotein) cholesterol that is the bad one and the HDL (high-density lipoprotein) that is the good and healthy cholesterol. Here is how the LDLs grade out in terms of risk factor implication:

Doctors actually recommend that everyone age 20 and older should have their cholesterol measured at least once every five years. If you're 30 to 39, once every two and a half years should suffice. If you're 40 to 70 or older, my doctor actually suggested you should have your cholesterol checked once a year minimum.

HDL Cholesterol -- The Good Cholesterol

Let's briefly chat about the HDL or healthy cholesterol for a moment. HDL cholesterol protects against heart disease. Therefore, the high the numbers the better, unlike the LDL cholesterol rating scale. Let's look at the following grid or table as to what to look for.

Needless to say, you should shoot for the 60 to 51 mg/dL range for the health risk factor is low there for heart disease. What about triglycerides? Triglycerides can also raise heart disease risk as they are another form of fat in the blood and medical science believes it is also a contributor to heart disease as well.

According to the American Heart Association, the following risk factor scale should be used when analyzing triglyceride levels.

When you get your blood test, which is called a "lipoprotein profile", that is when these grids and the corresponding numbers become truly understandable.

The blood test is done typically when your doctor or healthcare professional advises you to prepare for the test by going 9 to 12 hours without food or drink. The blood test will produce information for all the above, i.e.,:

• Total cholesterol count
• LDL cholesterol
• HDL cholesterol
• Triglycerides

Depending on the test, you may not get a complete lipoprotein profile. However, you should at least know your total cholesterol level and your HDL profile as well.

Let's close out our lowering cholesterol discussion by discussing just what affects your cholesterol levels.

What Affects My Cholesterol Lipoprotein Profile?

There are a number of factors that can influence your cholesterol levels. Some you can control, a couple you cannot. However, as most of the factors are in your circle of influence, you can change and affect your cholesterol lipoprotein profile significantly through a systematic, well-balanced program of healthy eating and exercise.

That said, here are the main factors that influence your cholesterol profile:

• Diet. Yes, the cholesterol in the foods you eat do influence your lipoprotein profile. Animal products in particular like red meat, dairy products and eggs are high in cholesterol. Saturated fat is the main culprit there. The western diet is too high in meat and dairy products. Plant-based sterols are not believed to be a dangerous risk factor to humans as animal cholesterol. In fact, they are touted as a lowering cholesterol supplement. Reducing the amount of saturated fat and cholesterol in your diet will significantly lower your blood LDL cholesterol and triglyceride levels. In a very fundamental way, saturated fat and cholesterol in the food you eat make your blood cholesterol level go up. Your body does need some cholesterol as it is actually created in your body too for cholesterol is a class of sterols that are important organic molecules to the body. The body can produce what it needs but with ingestion of certain foods on a consistent basis, our cholesterol levels go far beyond what nature intended.

• Exercise. Lack of physically activity is a risk factor for heart disease. Many follow a sedentary lifestyle without any exercise program. Combined with an unhealthy diet exacerbates your cholesterol levels. Studies show systematic physical activity lowers LDL cholesterol and raises HDL cholesterol levels.

• Weight. Obesity is a risk factor for heart disease. Losing weight will lower your LDL and total cholesterol levels, raise your HDL, and lower your triglyceride levels as well. Needless to say, diet and exercise play can play a significant role in losing weight and thus influencing your blood cholesterol levels for as you've undoubtedly noticed, all of these factors are interrelated.

As mentioned in the first paragraph of this section, there are some factors you cannot control, namely age, gender and heredity. Generally speaking, the older we become, the higher our cholesterol levels rise. Heredity can also play a factor. Some simply have a genetic disposition toward high cholesterol. This can be mitigated somewhat, though, through a diet high in plant-based foods and exercise.

How to Lower Cholesterol Secret

I promsied you earlier that I would reveal a secret herb that almost no one knows about, which is readily available to you in your area. The herb is cayenne pepper. Cayenne, or capsicum as it's sometimes called, is one of the greatest health secrets in the world.

The health benefits of cayenne pepper are almost too unbelieveable yet clinical studies initiated all over the world have proven its efficacy. I say cayenne pepper is a "secret" for I am convinced there are forces in this country that do not want people knowing about the healing benefits of medicinal herbs like cayenne.

Why? Because of money.

The number one cholesterol lowering drug is Lipitor, a product of Pfizer. Lipitor, according to a report in Cape Cod Today, makes up 40% of Pfizer's profits. In 2006 sales of Lipitor were US$12.9 billion making Lipitor the single largest-selling drug in the world.

In 2007, Pfizer made over 48.4 billion dollars gross profit! In 2008, it made around 42 billion. So, that's around 9 to 10 billion dollars selling a drug that Pfizer's own website said, "In fact, in some clinical studies, Lipitor has been proven to be as safe as taking a sugar pill."

What?! Really!? That's simply not true. In 2006, 17 law suits were filed accusing Pfizer of deceptive marketing practices alleging the company promoted Lipitor as a safe drug with limited health risks while failing to properly warn physicians and patients of Lipitor’s more dangerous side effects that include nerve damage, memory loss and other cognitive impairments. The 17 lawsuits filed assert that Pfizer's Lipitor product is defectively designed and "lacks adequate patient warnings as to its potential cognitive and neuromuscular dangers."

Furthermore, since 2001, the FDA itself expressed concerns that Lipitor’s marketing materials did not reflect the health risks the drug poses. This is astonishing as the FDA, Big Pharma, and the government are hand-in-hand in making sure people use drugs for disease for the profits to be derived are astronomical.

In June 2006, and let me quote this directly from the report, "Pfizer was sued by a group of union and employee insurance plans who charged the company with fraudulently marketing Lipitor for off-label uses not approved by FDA protocols for cholesterol treatment, which has resulted in billions of dollars in unnecessary prescriptions for the drug."

You see folks, cayenne pepper could eliminate all that. It's safe without virulent side effects like Lipitor has been reported as having and emulsifies cholesterol and triglycerides off the aterial wall, nourishes the heart, kills cancer cells and a whole host of other health benefits. (Molecularly distilled fish oil supplements work well too.)

What's the cost of cayenne pepper powder? I've seen it sell for as little as $1.67 USD a pound and as much as $30 a pound. Needless to say, even the $30 a pound is extremely inespensive compared to the cost of a bottle of a statin drug that has reported side effects.

You can get cayenne pepper powder at any health food store in your area too. It's readily available all around the world. For more information on cayenne pepper, please visit my other health site CayennePepper.info.

Summary

In closing, we've gone over a lot of information on this page. We've covered key pieces of information you need to know. The exciting news here is that you can lower your cholesterol without resorting to extreme means. The food you eat plays a significant factor in your cholesterol levels and thus your risk factor level to heart disease, the number one killer in America and elsewhere.

Can statin drugs help you? Possibly. I do know that cayenne pepper works incredibly well, nourishing the heart and lowering your risk factor for heart disease and at a cheap price. It's eminently affordable to all.

I hope this page has been useful to you.

Yours in health,
Nutritional-Supplement-Bible.com