On the pulse: cholesterol report – “could do better”

Looking around at the ‘health revolution” that’s been going on in our society since the aerobics boom of the 1980s, you’d think we’d have things sorted out by now. However despite widespread health marketing, we’re in trouble when it comes to our hearts. Cardiovascular disease is still our biggest killer. It is responsible for heart-breaking losses of family members, damaging loss of productive members of society, and the loss of ‘big hearts’ who have done good deeds in the community. Sadly, it is responsible for a great deal of disability and poor quality of life in those who survive devastating heart attacks and strokes, and painful vascular disease in the legs. One of the important ways to reduce your risk is to get your cholesterol under control, yet in Australia one in two adults have high cholesterol and this statistic has not changed in 25 years. You don’t have to look far to find someone with high cholesterol, yet diet and lifestyle are very effective in getting it down. Do you know your cholesterol? It’s hard to take action when you are unaware of the problem. Even if you have been tested in the past, you need to keep track of it over time. Now that the holiday season is over and you settle in to the normal rhythm of 2010, please make an appointment with your doctor for a cholesterol test. If your result is high, you can rely on us to help get it down with help from Eat to beat Cholesterol and Heart Food.