James Sullivan, the drummer for the Huntington Beach rock band Avenged Sevenfold, died on Monday, according to Orange County authorities. The cause of death is still under investigation. Sullivan, 28, was found unresponsive inside his home.
High total cholesterol and low HDL cholesterol increases the ratio, and is undesirable. Conversely, high HDL cholesterol and low total cholesterol lowers the ratio, and is desirable. An average ratio would be about 4.5. Ideally we want to be better than average if we can. Thus the best ratio would be 2 or 3, or less than 4.
These guidelines can be used to determine healthy cholesterol ratios as well. For example, a patient with total cholesterol number 200, LDL number 100, and HDL number 60 has a Total/HDL cholesterol ratio of 200/60 and an LDL/HDL ratio of 100/60. This gives an optimal Total/HDL ratio of about 3.3:1 and an optimal LDL/HDL ratio of about 1.7:1.