Your diet directly affects your cholesterol level and your weight. The best treatment for lowering your cholesterol level and your weight is making modifications to your diet. When creating a good low-cholesterol and low-fat diet, limit your intake of saturated and trans fat as well as dietary cholesterol, while incorporating healthy fats, fish and fiber.
Purpose
Excessive cholesterol and fat consumption can lead to serious health problems. Obesity can put you at great risk for diabetes, high blood pressure and osteoarthritis among other things. High cholesterol increases your risk of heart disease. Enough cholesterol can block the flow of blood through your arteries and cause a heart attack and stroke. A low-cholesterol, low-fat diet can prevent all these conditions.
Monitor Fat Intake
Monitor the amount, and type, of fat in your diet. Saturated and trans fat raise your cholesterol. The Mayo Clinic states that you should get no more than 10 percent of your daily calories from saturated fats. Trans fats should be eliminated as much as possible. Instead of choosing these fats, try to incorporate more monounsaturated fat into your diet. Found in olive and canola oil, monounsaturated fat increases your level of HDL, the good cholesterol that helps to prevent heart disease.
Limit Dietary Cholesterol
Your body produces cholesterol naturally, but you also get a lot of cholesterol from your diet. Therefore, if you are trying to lower your cholesterol, the first step is simply to limit the cholesterol you are getting from food. The Mayo Clinic recommends getting less than 300mg of cholesterol a day. Animal products contain the most cholesterol, specifically organ meats, egg yolks and whole-milk products. Try to limit your consumption of these foods or find substitutes, such as skim milk or lean meats.
Eat More Fish
Certain types of fish, including salmon, tuna and halibut, are good cholesterol-lowering foods. Compared to meat, fish are a healthier protein option, because they have less total fat, saturated fat and dietary cholesterol. These fish are also high in omega-3 fatty acids. These fatty acids reduce blood pressure and help prevent heart disease. The American Heart Association recommends eating seafood at least twice a week. If you cannot or do not eat fish, you can take omega-3 supplements.
Fiber
Fiber reduces the amount of cholesterol absorbed into your bloodstream, thus lowering your cholesterol. Five to 10g of fiber a day can prove to be effective in improving you cholesterol. Fiber is found in many foods, including fruits and vegetables, kidney beans, oatmeal and barley.
Expectations
A proper diet can have dramatic effects on your condition. A modification in your diet is most often the best and most important treatment option. According to the Mayo Clinic, a low-fat diet is vital in losing weight and a low-cholesterol diet can work better than medications to lower cholesterol.
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