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Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes (TLC) Diet for High Cholesterol

Overview

People have varying degrees of success in lowering their cholesterol by changing their diets. People who have high cholesterol because they eat too many fatty foods may be able to lower their cholesterol 10% to 20% with diet changes alone, while others may only achieve a 5% to 8% reduction. Those who are most successful using diet changes to lower their cholesterol are those who lose excess weight. Diet changes are usually the first step in lowering cholesterol before medicines are added.

The Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes (TLC) diet is recommended by the National Cholesterol Education Program of the U.S. National Institutes of Health. The diet's main focus is to reduce the amount of saturated fat you eat, because saturated fat elevates your cholesterol. You can reduce the saturated fat in your diet by limiting the amount of meat and milk products you eat. Choose low-fat products from those food groups instead. Replace most of the animal fat in your diet with unsaturated fat, especially monounsaturated oils, such as olive, canola, or peanut oil. Monounsaturated fat lowers LDL ("bad") cholesterol if it is substituted for saturated fat and keeps HDL ("good") cholesterol up.

The TLC diet calls for less than 7% of your daily calories to come from saturated fat and for eating no more than 200 mg of dietary cholesterol a day. But the diet allows 25% to 35% of daily calories from fat, mainly from unsaturated fat.¹ Most of the fat should be monounsaturated, and only 10% should be polyunsaturated fat. Your diet should include only enough calories to maintain your desired weight and avoid gaining weight.

**Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes (TLC) diet recommendations**
Food group	Number of servings	Serving size
Lean meat, poultry, fish, dry beans, and dry peas	No more than 5 ounces total a day	5 ounces maximum a day of lean meat, poultry, or fish Substitute ¼ cup dry beans or peas for 1 ounce of meat.
Eggs	No more than 2 yolks a week	1 whole egg. Egg whites or substitutes are not limited.
Low-fat milk and milk products	2–3 a day	1 cup fat-free or 1% milk 1 cup nonfat or low-fat yogurt 1 ounce nonfat or low-fat cheese (3 grams of fat or less per ounce)
Fruits	2–4 a day	1 piece fruit, such as apple, orange, or ½ a banana ½ cup canned fruit 1 cup berries or melon ¾ cup fruit juice
Vegetables	3–5 a day	1 cup raw leafy greens ½ cup cooked or raw vegetables ¾ cup vegetable juice
Bread, cereals, pasta, rice, and other grains	At least 6 a day	1 slice of bread ½ hot dog or hamburger bun, bagel, or English muffin 1 ounce cold cereal ½ cup cooked pasta, rice, noodles, or other grains
Sweets and snacks	Within calorie limit	Choose snacks that are low in fat or are made with unsaturated fat.

Related Information

References

Citations
Grundy SM, et al. (2001). Executive summary of the third report of the National Cholesterol Education Program (NCEP) Expert Panel on Detection, Evaluation, and Treatment of High Blood Cholesterol in Adults (Adult Treatment Panel III). JAMA, 285(19): 2486–2497.

Credits

By	Healthwise Staff
Primary Medical Reviewer	E. Gregory Thompson, MD - Internal Medicine
Specialist Medical Reviewer	Carl Orringer, MD - Cardiology, Clinical Lipidology
Last Revised	May 26, 2011

By:

Healthwise Staff

Last Revised: May 26, 2011

Medical Review:

E. Gregory Thompson, MD - Internal Medicine
Carl Orringer, MD - Cardiology, Clinical Lipidology

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