Is cholesterol important for muscle and testosterone?

Your brain, nervous system, and muscles all need cholesterol to function. This is why cholesterol is important! Your body makes most of the cholesterol you need, about 3000 mg of cholesterol per day. Dietary cholesterol only accounts for 20-25 percent of your total cholesterol. Despite what you may have heard, consuming foods high in cholesterol does not increase your blood cholesterol levels.

Cholesterol is needed to make vitamin D and is also necessary in the production of bile, which helps to digest fats. Cholesterol and muscle building go hand in hand. Muscles require cholesterol to make them stronger and bigger. Cholesterol is a precursor for certain sex hormones and is anabolic in nature meaning that it builds things up. Without cholesterol, your body can not make testosterone.

When someone has high cholesterol, they are often prescribed statin drugs. Statins block the pathway to make cholesterol in the liver, shutting down the total production of cholesterol.

Side effects of statin drugs include:

•Myopathy—destruction of your muscle cells

•Myositis—an inflammatory condition of the muscles

•Muscle pain

•Back pain

•Weakness of the muscles

•Low coenzyme Q10 which is important for your heart

There’s also a black box warning because statins can cause diabetes and increase your risk for heart attacks, the exact problem they are supposed to prevent.