Lower Cholesterol: Can Your Low Cholesterol Level Be Bad?

We know how importance lower cholesterol levels are. It can decrease our risk for heart disease, stroke and heart attack. But can our cholesterol levels be too low? Since our bodies make cholesterol it makes sense our body needs this chemical, but what happens if the body doesn't have the cholesterol it needs?

First, abnormally low cholesterol levels have been linked with anxiety, depression, suicide, and violent behavior. An article published in the periodical Psychosomatic Medicine in May of 1999 makes a startling revelation.

Total Cholesterol Levels
It refers to a study of healthy young women with total cholesterol levels below 160 mg/dl. It reports these women were more likely to make high scores on tests used to measure levels of depression and anxiety than those with normal cholesterol levels.

Medical data has also shown men with low cholesterol levels are 50-80 percent more likely to be the victim of a homicide, suicide or fatal accident than those with normal cholesterol levels.

Link
Researchers suspect there may be a link between low cholesterol levels and low serotonin level. Serotonin is a "feel good" chemical found in the brain. People with low levels of serotonin are those who have problems with depression and anxiety. So, these lower cholesterol levels can cause depression.

Other studies into the effects of abnormally low cholesterol also show there may be some link between low blood cholesterol and cancer. Researchers are finding the lower the blood cholesterol level the higher the risk for cancer. Seemingly, the lower cholesterol levels may also increase your risk for cancer.

Increase Risk
Perhaps the most surprising result of all is that having abnormally low cholesterol can increase your risk for a stroke. While it is generally reported to be the other way around, there are studies that show abnormally low levels of cholesterol can cause more strokes than high cholesterol.

According to information in an article entitled The Cholesterol Myth posted on the website Second Opinions states studies of the Japanese people have backed up the fact lower cholesterol
than normal may cause more strokes.

The Japanese were an ideal people for the stroke study because they have had a rapid change over the past couple of decades in their eating habits. They have evolved from eating a low cholesterol diet high in rice and vegetables to eating more high fat foods. While it seems the Japanese who ate a higher fat diet would be more likely to have strokes, the number of strokes has decreased among the Japanese as their dietary fat increased.

Further Research
Further studies have shown there are two different types of strokes, those caused from clots and those caused from hemorrhaging. While high cholesterol does increase your risk of clot type strokes, research shows chances for a hemorrhagic stroke is increased by an abnormally low cholesterol level.

As you can see, while it is dangerous for your cholesterol to be too high, it is also dangerous for your levels to be too low. Research has shown that abnormally low cholesterol may be linked to depression and anxiety as well as an increase in strokes. Lower cholesterol may not necessarily be better.

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