High Cholesterol: how do you control it?

You can sub spicy turkey sausage, cooked and well drained.

Google Dr.Jenkins from St.Michaels Hospital in Toronto. The Profile Diet. Lots of soy (soy milk, tofu, edamame), beans, legumes (make lentil or split bean or white bean soup, nuts, peanut butter (natural), eggplant, okra, oatmeal for breakfast. All of these foods help to lower cholesterol. Dr.Jenkins himself is a vegan.

Great suggestions for lowering cholesterol! I also have recently been diagnosed with high cholesterol. My doctor doesn’t want to put me on statins because of my liver disease and some medications I am on that will interact with statins. So, we have decided to try diet and see if that will improve my cholesterol numbers. I am starting to read food labels and cook more with vegetable and olive oils.

I'm a 75 year-old woman with no health issues. My cholesterol numbers are - Total 204, LDL 122, HDL 62, Triglycerides 94. One of my Doctors is like yours, advising don't worry about it. Another Doctor wants me to take statins. I've read that statins do nothing for women but help only middle-age men. Does anyone know of qualified sources or studies that could confirm this as the side effects could outweigh the benefits derived from taking statins?

Welcome @harolddr, I have not heard that statins do nothing for women but help only middle-age men. I chose not to take them but to instead work on lowering the numbers with lifestyle changes. My decision was based on studies showing statins can induce neuropathy. Here are a couple of references on your question:

-- Women Versus Men: Is There Equal Benefit and Safety from Statins?: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26782824/
-- "Specifically, for every decrease of 40 mg/dl of LDL (bad cholesterol) when on treatment with a statin, the risk of major cardiovascular events was decreased by 16 percent in women and by 22 percent in men, which did not represent a statistically significant difference between the benefits in men and women." -- Efficacy and safety of LDL-lowering therapy among men and women: meta-analysis of individual data from 174 000 participants in 27 randomised trials: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0140673614613684

Have you discussed alternatives like lifestyle changes and diet vs taking statins with your doctor?

John, how have you done with lowering cholesterol with lifestyle changes? I'm doing the same thing because every statin I tried led to near-crippling leg cramps within the first week of taking it, even in micro doses. The good news is that, despite higher cholesterol, my echocardiogram, endopat and calcium score numbers are very good so the cardiologist isn't too worried, but I'd like to make more progress. My PCP has a woman patient with very high cholesterol, who cannot take statins either. Then the PCP added that she's 96 years old, walks a few miles every day and still does her own grocery shopping so he's not too worried about her cholesterol anymore ;-).

@callalloo, My biggest lifestyle change by far has been losing weight. I've been tagged as a pre-diabetic for more than 20 years with a family history of diabetes. My weight had always ranged from a high of 330 in my mid 50s to an average of 260 to 290 in my 60s. Weight Watchers helped some but it really came down to making a decision that I had to change some bad habits. So I found a great health blog by @LeeAase where I learned about intermittent fasting and graduated to limiting my intake of carbohydrates. More info on his blog here - https://www.social-media-university-global.org/my-health-journey/

You might find the following discussion helpful -- Low-carb healthy fat living. Intermittent fasting. What’s your why?: https://connect.mayoclinic.org/discussion/low-carb-healthy-fat-living-intermittent-fasting-whats-your-why/

Thanks, John. My eating plan is a work in progress so far but cutting (way) back on refined carbohydrates is at the top of the list. And cutting out sugar. I did this once years ago and can remember feeling a lot better, then kind of let my guard down. But at least I know it can be done though the first few weeks were challenging. Motivation helps :-).

Hi @johnbishop and @callalloo, I take plant sterols, currently betasitosterol, to manage my cholesterol. The doctor was not concerned because I always had high HDL, but after open heart surgery for a mitral valve repair, I was put on a statin, briefly, because I declined to take it. The plant sterols have reduced my cholesterol. I purchase them from Swanson Vitamins.

Thanks Teri! I was not familiar with it and see that Beta-Sitosterol also helps with BPH symptoms which I have and am taking medication to help. I may give this a try.