So my cholesterol results weren't quite as bad as I thought they'd be...
Category Everything Else
Reading Joe's post about his high cholesterol led me to think about getting mine checked out. I had been monitoring my blood pressure with one of those wrist cuffs, and I was consistently running in the moderately elevated range. I also had my cholesterol checked years ago, and the ratio of good to bad cholesterol was all messed up. I chose to ignore it that time, but I'm getting older and (hopefully) wiser. My 50+ pound weight loss notwithstanding, I was pretty sure the results of a test would be ugly. So I did the all day fast and went in to have my blood drawn last Friday (I *hate* needles!)...
The results came back in today. Surprisingly, my overall number is 180, which is lower than I thought it would be. LDL is about 15 points over what would be considered normal, and HDL is about 11 points under what is considered optimal. The triglycerides are also over the desired range by about 35 points. So while not the picture of perfect health, I'm not the walking heart attack waiting to die, either (apparently). These are numbers I can work with and work on...
Reading Joe's post about his high cholesterol led me to think about getting mine checked out. I had been monitoring my blood pressure with one of those wrist cuffs, and I was consistently running in the moderately elevated range. I also had my cholesterol checked years ago, and the ratio of good to bad cholesterol was all messed up. I chose to ignore it that time, but I'm getting older and (hopefully) wiser. My 50+ pound weight loss notwithstanding, I was pretty sure the results of a test would be ugly. So I did the all day fast and went in to have my blood drawn last Friday (I *hate* needles!)...
The results came back in today. Surprisingly, my overall number is 180, which is lower than I thought it would be. LDL is about 15 points over what would be considered normal, and HDL is about 11 points under what is considered optimal. The triglycerides are also over the desired range by about 35 points. So while not the picture of perfect health, I'm not the walking heart attack waiting to die, either (apparently). These are numbers I can work with and work on...
| Permalink |
Comments
Posted by Tom At 09:07:10 On 12/06/2006 | - Website - |
I'll go in for the fasting test in a few weeks and will at that time see about reducing the Zocor dosage. The KEY, I've read over and over and over, is sensible diet combined with EXERCISE to raise theHDL and lower the total cholesterol, thereby achieving that optimal ratio of < 3.
Dang, dude! You've dumped over 50 pounds. THAT is impressive!
Posted by Joe Litton At 06:34:44 On 12/06/2006 | - Website - |
http://www.medicinenet.com/gemfibrozil/article.htm
Posted by Tom At 20:56:46 On 11/06/2006 | - Website - |