Can I eat eggs if I have high cholesterol?

High cholesterol is a common disease among modern people, mainly occurring in middle-aged and elderly people. It is easy to cause high cholesterol due to excessive body fat or blood viscosity, or too much fat. Due to the improvement of current dietary conditions, eggs have become the first choice for many people. Many people believe that eating eggs every day can replenish physical strength, but eggs also contain high fat and nutrients. So, can patients with high cholesterol eat eggs?

Ingredients in eggs

Egg yolks contain high cholesterol, but will eating egg yolks necessarily increase serum cholesterol and lead to arteriosclerosis? Not necessarily. Because the synthesis of cholesterol in a healthy human body can be regulated by itself. If you consume more cholesterol, the amount synthesized in the body will be less and the decomposition will increase; if you consume less, the amount synthesized will be more and the decomposition will decrease.

The patient's serum cholesterol level is increased mainly due to factors such as endocrine or blood lipid metabolism disorders. Increased serum cholesterol is caused by the disorder of certain mechanisms in the body and is endogenous. The cholesterol in food is exogenous and will not significantly affect the level of endogenous cholesterol to cause hypercholesterolemia. What’s more interesting is that a report from the American Cancer Society pointed out that egg yolks not only do not promote arteriosclerosis and coronary heart disease, but are beneficial to patients with these diseases. The rich vitamin A in egg yolk has certain anti-cancer effects.

In addition to cholesterol, egg yolk is also rich in lecithin, a strong emulsifier that can shrink cholesterol and fat particles and keep them suspended. This helps lipids pass through blood vessel walls and be used by tissues, thereby reducing cholesterol in the blood. Lecithin was extracted from egg yolks and given to cardiovascular disease patients 4-6 spoons a day for 3 months. The serum cholesterol levels of these patients dropped significantly. It was also used to treat atherosclerosis with unexpected results, indicating that the lecithin in egg yolks has a therapeutic effect on hypercholesterolemia, making patients with "bold" (hypercholesterolemia) moving towards atherosclerosis less courageous and stop moving forward.

Cholesterol and protein combine to form lipoproteins, which are divided into very low-density lipoproteins, low-density lipoproteins and high-density lipoproteins according to their particle size. The first two can be deposited on the blood vessel walls, while the latter has the function of clearing cholesterol from the blood vessel walls. In this way, the ingredients in the eggs themselves can restrain and offset each other. Therefore, eating eggs will not harm your health. Its contribution to human health and nutrition is unquestionable, and the yolks do more good than harm to the human body.

Foods containing moderate amounts of cholesterol include: pig heart, pig tongue, pork fat, pork stomach, pork large intestine, pork floss, sausage, fatty beef, pork ribs, chicken, pork sandwich, duck meat, red sausage, silver carp, herring, river crab, ice cream, etc.

Foods containing low cholesterol include: lean meat, rabbit meat, yellow croaker, hairtail, skinless chicken, carp, shredded eel, square ham, white fish, jellyfish skin, milk, sea cucumber, etc.