How are stress and bad cholesterol related?
QUESTION: How are stress and bad cholesterol related? How does stress affect bad cholesterol metabolism?
ANSWER: Hi there,
Stress can negatively affect not only the cholesterol metabolism, but it damages all the metabolic process executed in the organism.
Because of this, it is quite important for everyone who is having high blood pressure, diabetes or elevation of the LDL cholesterol level to minimize the stress.
This causes increased secretion of adrenalin, noradrenalin, cortisol and aldosterone, hormones which also known as stress hormones. These hormones are making the organism to start accumulating molecules which are providing energy - glucose, cholesterol and fat acids, because the probably future fight requires a lot of energy.
The accumulation of these molecules is executed in the liver, but these molecules have to be transported to the muscles, brain, heart and other important organs.
As you probably know the molecules, which are transporting the cholesterol from the liver to the other tissues are the LDL molecules. Because of the accumulation of cholesterol in the liver, the organism is increasing the synthesis of LDL molecules respectively.
As you can see, this is leading to an elevation of the LDL cholesterol, which goes directly to the blood stream.
However, during the common stress you are not fighting people, which mean that you are not using the energy stored in the LDL cholesterol molecules. This is causing elevation of the LDL cholesterol concentration in the blood.
In addition, when these molecules are staying in the blood for a long time, they can be easily damaged by the speed of the blood flow, or by the free radicals, which are circulating in your body.
When these molecules are damaged once, they are becoming gummy and they can easily glue to the wall of the blood vessels - the start of the atherosclerosis development.
It is very important for everyone to control himself, especially those who are under a lot of stress. Pay attention that because of the mechanism mentioned above, a lot of people, who are experiencing too much stress, are suffering from cardio-vascular disease (CVD’s).
My advice for you is to find a way for relaxation.
Hope it helped!
Dr.Alba
What is the heart attack risk with cholesterol level below 150?
QUESTION: What is the heart attack risk with cholesterol level below 150?
ANSWER: Hi,
It is good that you are taking care of your health and especially of the condition of your cardio-vascular system, but you have to know that the calculation of the heart attack risk is very difficult process, which requires several parameters.
The exact cholesterol level is one of them, but you haven΄t mentioned parameters like your blood pressure values, being smoker, being diabetic, being overweight and your daily physical activity, which is still important.
However, a value of 150mg/dl of bad cholesterol is not that bad, but it is borderline high, which means that you have to take precautions.
Anyways, I΄m not able to estimate the exact heart attack risk of yours, but you can do it by your own. If you enter the AHA (American Heart Association) web site, you will find a calculator for the heart attack risk. In this calculator you have to fill all the parameters, which were mentioned above.
The calculator will tell you the exact heart attack risk of yours, but you have to know that sometimes the calculated risk doesn΄t correlate with the real one.
However, if you still want to protect your health and to prevent the heart attack development, there are few things which you can do about it.
Following these steps will help you lose weight, which will exclude one other risk factor - being overweight.
I understand that it is hard to follow all these steps, but you are doing this for your health and the health is the most important thing in the human΄s life.
Hope it helped!
Dr.Alba
