This Pet Corrects Cholesterol (that one doesn’t)

Several studies throughout the decades have proven that pets can improve stress levels and overall well-being.

But can pets improve cholesterol levels?

Yes, but only this one type of pet, says a new study published in the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings: “Innovations, Quality & Outcomes”.

The authors wanted to answer two questions: firstly, whether pet ownership, in general, could improve our cardiovascular health and, secondly, whether dog ownership, compared to the ownership of other pets, could improve our heart health.

To investigate this, they consulted data collected by the Kardiovize Brno 2030 study.

This study first collected the health and socioeconomic information of more than 2,000 people in the city of Brno, Czech Republic in 2013. It is meant to run through several follow-up visits until 2030.

Using the information from the 2018-2019 follow-up visit, the researchers examined the information of 1,769 of the subjects and rated them on the American Heart Association’s Life’s Simple 7. These include body mass index, diet, physical activity, smoking status, blood pressure, blood glucose, and total cholesterol.

They also interviewed all these participants and asked them about their pet ownership status.

When comparing pet owners with non-owners, it initially seemed like pet owners had superior cardiovascular health, specifically with better diets, more physical activity, lower blood sugar, and higher HDL cholesterol.

But after running the numbers through the appropriate statistical measures, the researchers could not conclude that it was the pet ownership that caused better heart health, as education level and age seemed to have as big an effect on both owners and non-owners as pet ownership had.

They then compared dog owners with people who owned no pets and with people who owned a pet other than a dog; here, education and age did not interfere with the results.

Dog owners were more likely to engage in physical exercise and to eat healthy diets. They were also more likely to have a lower waist circumference and a higher HDL cholesterol score.

Therefore, pet ownership, in general, may not be heart-healthier than non-pet ownership, but dog ownership is certainly healthier.

But your dog alone won’t cure your cholesterol. For that, you need to cut out this ONE ingredient you didn’t even know you were consuming…