Premature jubilation
It turns out that I should have taken with a grain of salt the perfunctory value statements made about my lipid levels by the office med tech or whoever it was (i.e. not the doctor) who called me Monday morning to tell me about the test results. As far as I can remember, she said that all four numbers were "good". Maybe she said that because all of the numbers had improved over last September; maybe there was a little indicator on the printout that showed them within a wide "acceptable" band.
Anyway, when I visited her yesterday afternoon, the doctor (eight months pregnant!) did not call any of the numbers "good". The triglycerides had dropped so precipitously that rather than smile about it she wondered aloud if I had fasted properly prior to the previous test (on which they were alarmingly high). Never mind that they were perfectly fine now. Total cholesterol, she at first said it was "way too high", until I pointed out that she was looking at last year's results for that number. She may have mumbled something about the new number being "ok"-- I don't really remember.
Anyway, LDL (bad) cholesterol is still a little too high, but I'm within 10 of the right number. HDL (good) cholesterol still too low, more than a little. So I'm supposed to try to cut out more cholesterol (and saturated fat?) from my diet to lower the LDL and exercise more to increase the HDL. Sigh. I'm not sure I can really cut all that much more out of my diet, and anyway, I want to live a little. The doctor did point out what anyone who has seen those goofy TV commercials knows already, which is that high cholesterol partly comes from diet, and partly from your family (i.e. your genes).
I wish there was a way to get more perspective on this, i.e. what kind of danger these particular deviations really represent.
Sorry this was so boring.
Anyway, when I visited her yesterday afternoon, the doctor (eight months pregnant!) did not call any of the numbers "good". The triglycerides had dropped so precipitously that rather than smile about it she wondered aloud if I had fasted properly prior to the previous test (on which they were alarmingly high). Never mind that they were perfectly fine now. Total cholesterol, she at first said it was "way too high", until I pointed out that she was looking at last year's results for that number. She may have mumbled something about the new number being "ok"-- I don't really remember.
Anyway, LDL (bad) cholesterol is still a little too high, but I'm within 10 of the right number. HDL (good) cholesterol still too low, more than a little. So I'm supposed to try to cut out more cholesterol (and saturated fat?) from my diet to lower the LDL and exercise more to increase the HDL. Sigh. I'm not sure I can really cut all that much more out of my diet, and anyway, I want to live a little. The doctor did point out what anyone who has seen those goofy TV commercials knows already, which is that high cholesterol partly comes from diet, and partly from your family (i.e. your genes).
I wish there was a way to get more perspective on this, i.e. what kind of danger these particular deviations really represent.
Sorry this was so boring.
posted by Joel GL at 5:41 PM
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