Unhealthy lifestyles and food habits have increased the risk of increased bad cholesterol in the body lately, which leads to conditions like cardiovascular disease risks. In fact, today, the majority of heart attack cases are linked to a higher build of bad cholesterol in the patient’s body. While medical science has come up with several medicines to tackle this condition, most people prefer to look out for natural remedies at an earlier stage.
So, why is natural cholesterol management gaining popularity these days? Let us discuss more about it ahead.
Bad Cholesterol: Symptoms and Impacts
When low-density lipoprotein or bad cholesterol increases in the body, it leads to a higher risk of cardiovascular conditions such as strokes and heart attacks. The bad cholesterol deposits in the artery walls and slowly it reduces blood flow, causing cardiovascular conditions in the long run. Apart from cardiovascular conditions, the patient can suffer from many other issues like kidney diseases, diabetes, and high blood pressure.
You can understand about bad cholesterol build-up in the body based on these symptoms:
- Fatigue: When blood flow reduces in the body, it leads to issues like weakness in the limbs and increased fatigue.
- Shortness of Breath: Often when blood is not properly reaching out to the heart, it causes shortness of breath even during slightest of activities.
- Chest Pain: You may experience chest pain at times if you have ignored the existence of bad cholesterol in your body for a long time.
- Skin Changes: The pinkish or reddish color on your skin is due to the regular blood flow in your arteries and veins. However, when blockages reduce blood flow, it shows on your skin as the skin color may start changing to slight yellowish.
Why Natural Cholesterol Management is Gaining Popularity?
While medical science has drug options available for bad cholesterol, today natural cholesterol management is gaining popularity due to several reasons. Let us explore some of the common ones.
- Concerning Side Effects: Various cholesterol-lowering drugs like statins may cause side effects like liver damage, diabetes, or muscle pain. So, while the drugs may help individuals to reduce bad cholesterol in the body, they can cause several other ailments. This is a major concern among different individuals now, because of which most people start natural remedies initially to treat cholesterol.
- Efficient Natural Remedies: Another reason natural treatment is becoming popular is its higher efficiency in reducing cholesterol in the body. Experts have mentioned several ingredients like flax seeds, plant stanols, and omega-3 fatty acids to be highly effective in treating cholesterol conditions. According to research, a daily intake of 0.6 to 3.3 grams of plant stanols has the capacity to reduce about 6% to 12% of bad cholesterol in the body.
- Lifestyle Changes: Many lifestyle changes such as regular exercising and making dietary changes are also highly efficient in reducing bad cholesterol in the body. Certain lifestyle changes like quitting smoking, weight management, increasing fiber intake, and regularly performing cardio activities help in maintaining the level of cholesterol. As per research, exercising regularly also increases good cholesterol in the body, lowers bad cholesterol, and reduces cardiovascular risks.
- Growing Awareness: With increasing health concerns, people are becoming more aware of adopting healthier habits to keep diseases and ailments at bay. While one of the reasons to stay healthy is to stay disease-free, another big reason is to stay away from drugs and medicines on a regular basis. Often drugs and medicines tend to alter something or the other in a person’s health. Thus, the main point is to stay away from the impacts of such drugs in the long run.
Natural Ways to Combat Bad Cholesterol
When people are getting closer to the natural treatment methods, it gets interesting to know about these natural methods.
- Home Remedies: One of the most common ways is to try out home remedies to fight bad cholesterol in your body. There are several ways such as including soy protein, garlic, fiber, and whole grains in your daily diet.
- Shift to a Better Lifestyle: Another great natural way is to make a potential shift in your lifestyle. Choose a healthy diet over the regular junk that you have been consuming. Invest at least half an hour for exercising and make sure to get your cholesterol test done regularly.
- Holistic Approach: If the home remedies and lifestyle changes are not helping much, there are now several holistic options to treat your bad cholesterol. You can opt for options like Ayurveda, Homeopathy, and similar others to treat your bad cholesterol. Though these treatment methods also treat using medicines, the chances of having side effects are much lower. Thus, you can consider these techniques as natural methods of treatment.
Increasing bad cholesterol can have life-threatening impacts. Thus, it is essential to get it in control as soon as you get to know about it. While modern medicine offers several drugs to control cholesterol, it also has its side effects. Thus, most people today get the natural approach to reduce bad cholesterol. No doubt, natural cholesterol management is gaining popularity with each passing day.