What Is Lipid Disorder? Know The Symptoms And Factors Causing This Disorder

Having a healthy meal can be tricky sometimes and often we end up having junk food that increases our cholesterol levels. Increased cholesterol levels can be a root cause of many health diseases. Gradual intake of this bad cholesterol in your diet can increase your low-density lipoproteins in your blood can results to lipid disorder. These low density lipoproteins have fatty acids and bad cholesterol called triglycerides that affect our health adversely. Today let us understand what affect these triglycerides have on our health and the cause behind lipid disorders. To help us through we have Ms. Shikha Nagpal, Clinical Nutritionist from Apollo Hospital, Noida. 

What is Lipid Disorder?

Increase in the levels of low density lipoproteins and triglycerides can result to lipid disorder. LDL slowly built over a period of time by consumption of food that is high in cholesterol levels. This results in accumulation of triglycerides and LDL’s in tissues inside the body including arteries which cause serious complications and disorders. Lipid disorder is imbalance created due to increase in LDL cholesterol levels in blood. It leads to obesity and is one of the major causes of heart attack. Lipid disorders cannot be generally determined unless it causes serious discomfort to your body and fatty materials get accumulated in large amount in your tissues. 

Symptoms of Lipid Disorder

As mentioned earlier, a person having disorder will have no or negligible symptoms in most cases. Lipid disorder do not have any significant symptoms until the LDL Cholesterol levels rise to a levels that it causes sudden strokes or heart attack. 

In some cases, few symptoms have come to notice that can be signs that you are having very high lipid levels in your body. These symptoms are-

• Yellowish or fatty bumps on your skin
• Yellowish creases or marks on the skin near tendons or joints
• Raised lumps in inner corner of eyes, little yellowish in color
• White arcs around the cornea in the eye

What Causes Lipid Disorder?

There are number of factors that can be responsible for causing lipid disorder. It can include genetics, lifestyle changes or any health condition. Here are some common causes of lipid disorder.

Genetics

In many cases the symptoms of lipid disorders are transferred in the family. It is possible that lipid disorder may occur because of high cholesterol level running in the family thus leading affected person. This can however prevent having heart diseases or serious problems if you are aware of it and is carried from the genes. You can get yourself tested to check if you have high cholesterol levels.

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Diet Routine

Your diet highly determines your chances of falling for lipid disorder. If you tend to eat food that has high cholesterol and saturated fats then it is more likely that you may get this disorder. There are two types of fat that increase cholesterol levels- saturated fats and trans fats.

Saturated fats- These types of fats increase your LDL levels slowly. It mostly comes from animal fat or animal based food but some plant based food can also increase LDL levels in the body. Palm oil and coconut oil are also saturated fats and thus should be used precisely. Other products include cheese, milk, butter and steak etc. 

Trans Fat- These fatty acids those are even worse than saturated fats. This can increase bad cholesterol at a much higher rate in your body. Major amount of trans fat you consume come from processed food that undergo hydrogenation. Some common examples are potato chips and margarine. Other source of trans fat is through natural animal products.

Lifestyle Factors

Some lifestyle factors including your habits and routine can also influence levels of cholesterol in your body. Some factors that can lead to lipid disorder are-

• Smoking or tobacco consumption
• Drinking too much alcohol
• Taking certain medications
• Being overweight or obese
• Being physically inactive or very lazy

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Diseases or Medical Conditions

If you have certain medical problems or diseases then you may be at higher rate of falling for lipid disorder. High blood cholesterol levels can be caused by these medical problems-

• Metabolic syndrome
• Kidney diseases
• Diabetes
• Hypothyroidism
• Cushing’s syndrome
• Metabolic syndrome
• Polycystic ovary syndrome

Conclusion

Lipid Disorder occurs when you have high levels of low-density lipoproteins (LDL) in your blood. Bad cholesterol usually comes from processed food or food with high saturated or trans fat. LDL’s and triglycerides accumulate over the tissues which further cause diseases such as heart attack and stroke. Lipid disorder does not have any major symptoms that are significant however sometimes people get yellowish boils or spots over their skin and in eyes. This disorder can be caused by a number of factors. Know these factors to prevent yourself from falling for lipid disorder.

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