New Insight Into Cardiac Risks
Evaluation of the lipid profile has become routine practice to determine one’s risk for heart disease. Routinely, health professionals generally agree that low overall and LDL-cholesterol readings and high HDL readings along with low serum triglyceride levels reflect a low risk for disease. By studying individuals with mutations in the ABCA1 gene that result in reductions in HDL cholesterol levels but not increases in triglyceride levels, researchers were able to determine that this lifetime low HDL level was not a risk factor for ischemic heart disease. This data adds new insight to the evaluation of cardiac risk and may reduce the number of people who take medication to achieve optimal heart health.
About the Author
Peggy Kraus is a clinical exercise physiologist at Southampton Hospital in New York. She received her Masters degree in Professional Physical Education from New York University and after many years in commercial and corporate fitness settings has been in the cardiac and pulmonary rehab setting now for 10 years. Her job duties include educating rehab patients about the link between exercise, nutrition, and good health. Peggy has been published in IDEA’s Fitness Journal and in AFAA’s American Fitness, and her continuing education course, Atherosclerosis: Causes, Consequences, and Treatments, is offered in CEU4U’s nursing course catalog.
