Relation of Alcohol, Physical Activity, Dietary Fat and Smoking to Serum HDL and Total Cholesterol in Young Finnish Men

• Published in: Scandinavian Journal of Social Medicine
• Main Authors: Salonen, Jukka T., Hämynen, Heikki, Leino, Ulla, Kostiainen, Ella, Sahi, Timo
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: SAGE Publications 1985
• Subjects: Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health; Northern Finland
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/140349488501300305; http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/140349488501300305

The study was based on 471 men, aged 19 to 20 years, who started their compulsory military service in three military bases in Southwest, Southeast and Northern Finland in February 1982. The data were gathered by means of self-administered questionnaires. A fasting venous blood specimen was taken to determine serum HDL and total cholesterol, gamma-glutamyltransferase and thiocyanate. In this cross-sectional study a few variables based on the self-administered questionnaire explained 8% and 7% of the variation in serum HDL and total cholesterol, respectively. Our results show that easily measurable behavioural factors do contribute to serum HDL and total cholesterol levels in young men. In our study the impact of alcohol consumption on serum HCL cholesterol was greater than in most previous studies. Our findings give additional support to the hypothesis that even a very modest amount of regular physical exercise has the effect of increasing the serum HDL cholesterol level.