Fish Oil To Lower Cholesterol

Cholesterol seams to be everywhere – on the radio, on the TV, in every written material you pick up.  In fact it’s gotten plenty of bad press lately.  There’s plenty of fear going around about whether there is too much cholesterol in our diet and how to reduce it.  Some are quickly turning to prescription drug solutions but what about something as simple as fish oil to lower cholesterol ?

Why do we always go straight for the big guns ?  The drugs most often used to reduce cholesterol are statin drugs like Lipitor which is almost a household word already.  Now these drugs definitely do help and in fact in some cases they save lives.  The trouble is we seem to go from doing nothing to protect our lives to drastic measures like Lipitor.

Why not be proactive ?  For instance it’s a well known fact that fish oil is good for us and it can help reduce cholesterol levels.  So rather than waiting until we have a problem why not start taking fish oil now ?

We eat diets that are far too high in saturated fats and hydrogenated fats [also called trans fats] which cause our liver to produce cholesterol.  Now don’t run off and take all fats out of your diet because not all fats are bad.

Polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats are actually good for us helping to reduce the bad cholesterol.  Omega 3 fatty acids which are found in fish oil are also very important to our health reducing triglyceride levels and increasing our good cholesterol.

There are two types of cholesterol – the one that’s good for us and the one that’s bad for us.  HDL or high density lipoprotein is the good one while LDL or low density lipoprotein is the bad one.  Trans fats are a type of fat that the body cannot handle causing an unhealthy cholesterol ratio. 

In a perfect world you would want high HDL and low LDL levels.  High levels of LDL are linked to heart disease so it would only make good sense to make sure that the bad cholesterol in our body is taken care of.

Now there is another factor that you need to be aware of.  That’s the triglyceride level that is also linked to heart disease.  Research indicates that high triglyceride levels increase your risk of having a heart attack.  Other research has shown that if the ratio between HDL LDL and triglycerides is wrong you are at a much greater risk of having a heart attack.

The bottom line is that you want to reduce the bad cholesterol and since it’s a proven fact that fish oil to lower cholesterol makes good sense you can either eat a lot more fish or you can take an omega supplement to ensure you are getting adequate levels.

You get one life and you want to make the most of it.  If you are lucky enough to survive a heart attack or stroke you could be left severely disabled.  Worse yet you may not survive at all.

The sad part is that we can reduce the risks of heart disease by more than 35% just by walking for 30 minutes three times a week, by eating healthier and by taking supplements like fish oil.  So why aren’t rates being reduced ? Are we really that lethargic ?  So aren’t you going to add fish oil to lower cholesterol ?