There was no any evidence that high HDL levels above 90mg/dL were desirable. According to the study, people with high HDL were more likely to die to a non-related matter of cardiovascular when compared to those who have HDL levels in the middle.

According to Dr. Dennis Ko, the lead researcher of the study and senior scientist at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences in Toronto,  having low HDL was linked to higher death rates and that suggests it is just a "marker" of things like having a general poor health and unhealthy lifestyle. It also means that having low HDL doesn't directly contributes to heart disease, UPI has reported.

According to Dr. Michael Shapiro, a member of the American College of Cardiology's Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease Section, said that the studies are going against conventional wisdom and in fact, doctors are indeed shifting away from the conventional wisdom cause people know that HDL is the 'good' cholesterol but they may don't know that the medical community is driving away from the idea that they've got to raise low HDL.

Clinical trials have tested the medications that boost the HDL levels and the vitamin niacin and the studies found that while treatments do raise the HDL levels, they make no alteration in people's risk of heart disease. Shapiro said that the research suggests that the gene variants with HDL levels have no any connection with having a risk of cardiovascular disease, via WebMD.

The causes of low HDL are smoking, overweight, poor diet, and sedentary lifestyle. The findings are based on the medical data and other records from 631,800 Ontario adults ages about 40 and up had almost 18,000 of them dies over five years. People with low HDL levels shows to have lower income and higher rates of diabetes, smoking, and high blood pressure and accounted all those factors, still low HDL still linked to higher rates of death.

According to Ko, that having low HDL is probably ad generic marker than a cause. According to Shapiro, the finding is "very interesting" but the reasons are still unclear.

Dr. Robert Eckel, a professor of medicine at the University of Colorado Denver, Anschutz Medical Campus, said that alcohol raises HDL levels and that raises the question whether heavy drinking explains the link, but Eckel said that raising HDL levels with the drug is not recommended. Another reminder from Dr. Shapiro according to lifestyle, get regular exercise, lose weight if needed and don't smoke.

The study was published Oct. 31 in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.