Hyperlipidaemia (High Cholesterol)

What is Hyperlipidaemia?

Lipids are another word for cholesterol, which is a fatty substance in your blood.

Cholesterol is made in your liver and float around in your blood. It can be helpful when used for things, like building new cells, but can be bad when you have too much of it.

There are different types of cholesterol; we have ‘good’ cholesterol known as HDL (high-density lipid) and ‘bad’ cholesterols like LDL (low-density lipid) and TG (Triglycerides).

HDL cholesterol helps our body pick up cholesterol we don’t use and take it to the liver to be broken down. Low amounts of HDL can increase chances of heart disease as it can’t clean up your blood.

LDL and TG, the bad cholesterol, allows for the building up of fatty deposits in your blood vessels, increasing chances of stroke or a heart attack. High levels of bad cholesterol can happen for many reasons, some reasons can be controlled, and some cannot.

Reasons that can be controlled:

  • Your diet – you can have high LDL if you eat lots of fatty, salty and low fibre foods
  • Smoking
  • Drinking lots of alcohol
    Being inactive.

Reasons that cannot be controlled:

  • Family history
  • Gender – males are more likely to have high cholesterol
  • Age – you’re more likely to have high cholesterol as you get older.
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