About Cholesterol

Cholesterol & You

Much has been said about diet and heart disease. High blood pressure, high blood cholesterol and weight all respond to dietary changes. Recent research has clearly identified saturated fat as the main influence on blood cholesterol, while all types of fat as well as lack of exercise affect wieght. Reducing salt and losing excess weight help lower the blood pressure.

Dietary cholesterol, once thought to be a major cause of high blood cholesterol, is now known to be a less important issue. Let's look at diet a little more closely.

The Healthy Diet Pyramid

Notice that the high fat and sugar foods are all at the top of the pyramid and should be the least eaten foods in your diet. Even the Eat some of us foods in the middle of the pyramid are important sources of fat.

The key issue is reducing fat intake. Health authorities recommend that fat should be less than 30% of all the kilojoules in your diet.

Cholesterol in food

Until recently it was thought that cholesterol in food was an important factor in high blood cholesterol. We now know that dietary cholesterol alone is not significant for most people. The body produces cholesterol in the liver - especially when the diet is high in saturated fat. Research done at the CSIRO’s division of Human Nutrition has shown that cholesterol in diet is far less important than many people think*.

Research showed that adding two eggs a day to the diet of people with normal cholesterol levels produced no rise in the level of LDL (or bad) cholesterol. Even at three eggs a day, the effect on blood cholesterol was equivalent to eating one pat (10g of butter or 30g of cheese. So, if saturated fat and not cholesterol is the most important dietary contributor to heart disease shouldn’t you be taking advantage of the benefits of eggs?

*A group of men and women were given various diets to determine the effect of the diets on blood cholesterol levels. Clifton P.M, Nestel P.J. Influence of Gender, Body Mass Index and Age in response of Plasma Lipids to Dietary Fat plus Cholesterol. Arteriosclerosis & Thrombosis: 12: 955-962.

Why do we need cholesterol?

It's many essential functions include - a building block for cell membranes, required for production of some hormones, essential for production of digestive juices, protection for nerve fibres. The body is able to make this cholesterol in the liver.