Question

Mathias is a 21-year-old collegiate baseball player. He has been consuming approximately 2,600 calories per day, feels energetic, recovers well, and has maintained his weight at 176 pounds for the last 2 years. After a recent blood test, he discovered that his total cholesterol is high. He is concerned about this result and asks for your assistance in making the necessary dietary changes to lower his cholesterol.

1. What is the maximum number of grams of total fat, as well as saturated fat, that you would recommend Mathias consume daily?
2. What other dietary advice would you give Mathias to help lower is blood cholesterol?

Answer 1

Too much fat in your diet, especially saturated fats, can raise your cholesterol, Idealy to be healthy the total recommended fat would be around 20% to 35% of total calories from fat. That is about 44 grams to 77 grams of fat per day if you eat 2,000 calories a day. For consuming 2,600 calories per day, recommended fat would be between 520 calories (around 57 grams) to 910 calories (100 grams). so target range for this individual would be total fat of about 57 to 100  grams a day.and in case of saturated fat it should be not more than 10% of his total fat, which would be around, 5 to 10 grams of saturated fat daily. Since this individuals total cholosterol is high, it is best he reduce the amount of saturated fat, which is refered to as bad cholosterol, ideally he should try to restrict to around 2 to 5 gms of saturated fat, evel less the better.

Changes in your diet can reduce cholesterol and improve your heart health,

Reduce the amount of saturated fat, foods like fatty cuts of beef, pork lamb,.dark chicken meat and poultry skin,whole milk, butter, cheese, sour cream, ice cream all contain high amount of saturated fat.

Be physicaly more active and try to reduce his body weight

Eat foods rich in omega-3 fatty acids, Fishes has high amount of omega-3-fatty acid, especialy fishes like salmon, mackrell contain large amount of these acids.

Avoid food containing Trans fat

Eat soluble fiber

So in summary, eating a healthy diet and leading a physicaly active life and avoiding smoking could all help him to lower his blood cholosterol