Excess bad cholesterol can lead to heart disease or stroke, so take into account a few steps to manage your cholesterol levels.
Nutritionist Lovisa Nilsson has shared her top tips on how to keep your cholesterol levels in control, reports femalefirst.co.uk.
* Superfruits: Following recent nutritional studies, several fruits have been labelled ‘superfoods’ due to their ability to combat harmful fats and reduce bad cholesterol. For instance, it was recently revealed that strawberries have the ability to reduce LDL (low-density lipoprotein), the harmful form of cholesterol, by nearly 14 per cent, according to research carried out by Universita Politecnica Delle Marche in Italy.
* Unsaturated fats: Consuming omega-3 essential fatty acids, found in unsaturated fats, will help to lower the levels of bad cholesterol in the blood. Unsaturated fats include oily fish, nuts and seeds, ground flax seeds, olive oil and certain vegetables and fruits such as avocado.
* Fibre: Beans, pulses, vegetables, cereal and whole grain breads all have a high fermentable fibre content and are therefore difficult for the gut to digest so they attach to bad cholesterol and then remove it from the body via waste.