Dr Amir Khan

Now, when that inflammation develops because your immune system is trying to fight that plaque, that plaque can become unstable.

So it starts because your immune system is trying to loosen it and get rid of it.

So as it becomes unstable, it can fly off into your blood and it can go down into a much narrower blood vessel and completely obstruct it.

And that's the real danger.

Yes.

Yeah.

Then it can completely obstruct the flow to that part of whatever body part that artery is supplying the blood to.

So it could be your brain, it could be your heart, it could be the back of your eyes, it could be your kidneys.

So all of those things are very, very problematic.

No, it's both.

So both a stroke and a heart attack are complete obstructions of blood flow to that particular part of your heart or your brain.

Yes, in combination with all the other risk factors for these things.

And then you've got the good ones.

You've got the HDLs, which do the exact opposite.

They take that cholesterol and the bad fats out of your blood to your liver and the liver gets rid of it.

So having high levels of HDLs and low levels of LDLs is where you want to be.

And your total cholesterol is that number you get given.

So when you're looking at your blood tests, you get the total cholesterol level, which is what people focus on.

And ideally, if you don't have something like diabetes or heart disease, existing heart problems, then your total cholesterol should be below five.

If you do have those conditions, we're much stricter with you.