How to Lower LDL Cholesterol - Diet and Lifestyle Tips

Learning how to lower LDL cholesterol is an important step for your overall health management regardless of whether you suffer from a heart condition.

Indeed, maintaining a healthy cholesterol profile will help you ward off a number of diseases, and most importantly, it will keep your heart functioning healthfully.

There are two major forms of cholesterol that you need to know about - LDL and HDL. LDL (low density lipoprotein) is the 'bad' form of cholesterol that you should be worried about because it is the one that will put you at risk for coronary artery disease. Ideally, you are looking for a total cholesterol level below 200 mg/dL and an LDL level lower than 100mg/dL.

Here is what you need to know about how to lower LDL cholesterol.

Choose Your Diet Wisely

One of the best ways to lower your bad cholesterol levels is to start paying attention to your diet. Those who are consuming foods that are high in saturated fat, such as non-lean meats and high-fat dairy, will be at highest risk of suffering from high LDL levels.

Better foods that you'll want to focus on instead are fruits and vegetables, fish, chicken, whole grains, and then the unsaturated sources of fats such as olive oil, flaxseeds, and nuts. These will help return your cholesterol levels closer to where they should be to promote a healthy heart.

Lose The Excess Weight

The second important step you need to take in order to effectively learn how to lower LDL cholesterol is losing any excess weight. As you adopt a healthier diet, you will likely find that you lose weight naturally; however, you need to make sure this happens by monitoring your calorie intake.

If you aren't tracking calories, even though you may be eating healthy, this doesn't necessarily mean you will be losing weight, since you must create a need for your body to turn to its own body fat stores for fuel.

Get To The Gym or Hit the Road

The third component of how to lower LDL cholesterol is to engage in regular physical activity. This gives you the double benefits of first giving your heart a workout and second, improving your blood cholesterol profile.

Both cardiovascular and resistance training exercises will be effective in improving the profile you see, so be sure you are completing both forms in your workout program.

Don't think that you have to go out and do five mile runs to get good benefits either - as little as thirty minutes of moderate paced walking a couple times a week can give you heart healthy benefits.

Moderate Your Alcohol Intake

Finally, the last thing that you should be focusing on in how to lower LDL cholesterol is to moderate your alcohol intake. There are studies that suggest a small amount of certain alcoholic beverages can be healthy (red wine for instance), but keep in mind this is in moderation. Many people take that a little too far and drink more than what's considered to be the healthy recommended dosage.

Too much alcohol can severely impact your health in a negative way, so this is something you do want to control.

Conclusion - How to Lower LDL Cholesterol

So keep these points in mind. Learning how to lower LDL cholesterol at this point in your life and then putting that knowledge into action is one of the best things you could be doing for your future heart health.

To learn more about lowering cholesterol naturally, read the other related cholesterol pages and articles.

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