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Statins

  • Thread starter Thread starter badcat
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Just before Christmas I attended a meeting of Diabetics and we had a local heart surgeon as a speaker. I was very surprised to hear that about 80% of his heart patients were diabetic and, of those the vast majority were older and T2. Younger diabetics appear to be getting less heart problems than they did 20 years ago.
He suggested that rather than giving people statins based on a target cholesterol level, the NHS would be better off setting a target of 100% for the number of diabetic people being put on statins, because many of his diabetic patients do not have excessively high cholesterol levels. He told us that the use of statins has greatly lowered the severity of damage caused to the heart and blood vessels of the patients he sees, making recovery far quicker and, more often than not, complete.
In relation to heart problems, the long term use of stains seems to be extremely beneficial to diabetic patients, providing they do not suffer any side effects of taking them.
 
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Montana said:
I still think that they are putting needless pressure on us without showing us written evidence!

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Why do they need to show you written evidence?
Your doctor advises you take them, either you believe he's competent after near enough a decade of training, or you don't.
If you don't believe him, don't take them.
How much resource would it take to convince you, then the next patient, then the one after that?
 
Unfortunately even the doctors don't agree and it's still a case of "you pays your money and makes your choice" when it comes to meds - my gp would dearly love me to take a statin cos it's in the targets for diabetics, my diabetes consultant on the other hand is clear that I should never take statins because I have had acute muscle inflammation requiring admission to intensive care as an adverse reaction to antibiotic medication, ( muscle inflammation is also a common adverse reaction to statins)
Personally I trust the consultant more than my gp and have seen plenty of worrying info re both statins and the relationships between medics and drug reps
 
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I knew the risks with statins, in fact the doctor advised me to take them and told me of the possible side effects at the time.
They're well known, it's also not a guaranteed side effect.
I tried them, was perfectly fine, so I take them daily.

As to the reason why they were prescribed, if you believe you were only prescribed them as the doctor has a target, or is on a kickback from the drug reps, rather than the belief the doctor thinks they may help your condition, why take any of the drugs they advise, they all have some possible negative side effect.
 
For me if my gp and my consultant give diametrically opposite and mutually exclusive advice on the same issue, then whilst I can absolutely believe both are trying to look after my best interests, I also have to absolutely assume that at least one of them is wrong!
 
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Douglas, the problem with statin side effects is that they can be serious and are quite common. Most drugs have a long list of side effects but normally most patients don't suffer them. My wife had serious liver inflammation a few days after taking them. Her doctor with over 10 years of training put her straight onto max dose (stupid and against recommendations). She tried again a few months later with a small dose with the same effect. Statins can and do cause muscle degeneration. CoQ10 tablets are rarely recommend by HCPs despite the fact that stains suppress this in the body and I understand heart muscle needs it. Statins increase blood sugar levels a bit. Ref the post about the Heart Surgeon speaker I would like to see more statistical evidence that the lower heart problems were due to the use of statins; it may be true but the association between the two needs some statistical evidence. Also would the younger diabetics have been taking statins anyway; I suspect many wouldn't have been?
 
Doctors are only as good as the training they have recieved, just like any other professional. Research moves on and people get left behind with the last bit of training they had on the subject. Add to that the unbeleivably long amount of time it takes to push the results of new research through to being incorporated into NICE guidelines and I think it quite acceptable to question what a doctor prescribes you to put into your body.

I have taken statins for a very long time, and despite rising doseages they failed to hold down my rising cholesterol and I have had to change them due to the serious side effects. The change in diet to low carb and increased activity level has made a far far bigger impact since the beginning of this year than the years of statins have.
 
Daibell said:
Also would the younger diabetics have been taking statins anyway; I suspect many wouldn't have been?
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I should have included the cardiac surgeon's idea of a "young" diabetic. He was referring to people aged between 30-50.
I still (probably foolishly) consider myself a time-served, young T1 diabetic at 47. I've been on statins for a good number of years now and, although I do have most of the usual diabetes side effects, including raised cholesterol levels, my heart shows no signs of any problems. However, I was put on the statin because of peripheral vascular disease and that appears to have been halted.
The surgeon's own observations show that statins seem to have the effect of allowing the vascular walls to remain more supple so, as well as controlling the cholesterol level, they also appear to prevent the furring-up process too, which is the main cause of heart problems. He does not consider that high cholesterol levels are directly responsible for the heart attacks or angina cases he treats in diabetic patients. I will hopefully be one of the first generation who has reached old age whilst having taken statins over a long period of time, if the rest of my body lets me.
 
i hate the statins subjext, with most subjests i can decide which side sounds best and go with that, but statins :( i take them but just dont know

as for training.... my wife has a hons degree in teaching specialising in maths and geography, she is terrible at maths, on tv the other day columbia came up and she thought it was in africa :facepalm:

i left school at 13 never took an exam in my life but knew that it wasnt, training is only as good as the brain taking it in, this isnt me thinking im clever this is me thinking training can mean little, you get good and bad doctors, postmen, cleaners, scientists....
 
There is no doubt myopathy has been reported as an adverse side effect.
.
It's documented what the side effect is - usually lower-extremity pain and weakness, occasionally lower arm, and shoulder, hip, and knee also severe muscle cramps.

I've seen the phrase repeated on here, many, many, times.
"Statins damage muscles, the heart is a muscle", but if anyone have just one clinical trial, or occurrence of heart damage, due to statins, I'd be very interested to see it, as I do take them, and if you have a reference to show they will damage my heart, I'd be grateful to see it and revise my choice.

I also agree, if you do have previous contra-indications, it's well advised to avoid them and reference badcat's post, I would discuss with them, why your doctor thought you should be on them. Either as you imply they are taking bungs, tying to hit targets, or just very poor from your opinion of them. Either way, I'd also consider moving practices.
 
I was first prescribed atorvastatin many years ago because I had a serious heart problem and I got everything from asprin to ACE inhibitors to reduce my risk of heart attack. The problem went away but I am still on all the same drugs. Doctors come and go and none seem to want to look into the history. They are in my notes and keeping the status quo is safer for the doctors. They don't have to make decisions or take time to investigate. I did ask my GP once why and he told me that statistically, I was more likely to live longer with statins than without. I pointed out that if you give any medication to healthy people that they don't need, it is going to make the drug look good. The sample set is weighted in favour of favourable outcomes. He grumbled and said I didn't understand, despite me telling him that I was a maths graduate and had read the book 'How to Lie with Statistics'.

Later I was told I needed statins, by now the cheaper Simvastatin, because of my diabetes and most recently because of my Microalbuminuria. It must be a wonderful drug to be so versatile. Personally I find whisky to be very good for lifting the mood and making troubles seem more remote and less worrying but fortunately, I am aware of its side effects.
 
I have had bad experiences with statins. The first brand made that I kind of 'lost it', i.e. blurry thinking, bad decision-making facilities (something which I certainly did not wish in my then very active working life). So I chose to go off it without consulting my doctor.

The next time (after db diagnosis), a young tempt doctor again pushed statins on me. I returned to the doctor after a week with elephantine legs and severe rashes, and said I wished to go off it. She then for me 'stupidly' (for me too see) claimed that I would just need to accept the side effects. I refused.

I then was prescribed another statin drug – and this time I actively and intensively searched the internet about information on statins. The result was that I have now chosen to only let statins pass my lips in the case that I will need to be force-fed.

In any case, 85 % of cholesterols are produced by our own body – our brains need it – otherwise the body would not produce it. And especially for women – of a certain age as I am now – a bit higher cholesterol levels are for the good. If I have properly understood the research I have read – the statistics say the women with higher cholestols live longer than those with lower cholesterols. (It may be different for men, though).

Anyway, as an aside: when I got my bg-levels down to a good place (low carb), my cholesterols have become numbers to dream about.

Annelise
 
badcat said:
I'm no fan of the torygraph but thought this was interesting
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/h...of-patients-may-be-on-statins-needlessly.html
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I haven't read the study, only the Torygraph report, but it seems to miss the link between calcification and cholesterol. Reducing LDL ( "Bad" Cholesterol) seems to be an excellent way of reducing the rate of calcification because cholesterol acts as the focus for calcium to accumulate on and mineralise in bothy cvd and Aortic Stenosis
Cholesterol is at the heart (sic) of calcification of the aortic valve for example ( Aortic Stenosis) which is a cause of Sudden Death. See below ....

http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/104/16/1881.short
 
badcat said:
http://people.csail.mit.edu/seneff/statins_muscle_damage_heart_failure.html
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Not anything useful there.

Good phrase in there

"plausible theory for the process by which muscle cells in the heart become dysfunctional with old age,"

can't argue with that I suppose, but hardly a reason to jump on the anti statin bandwagon, unless a better" plausible theory" comes along?

Then again

"patients with diastolic heart failure who were taking statins had a significantly poorer outcome than patients who were not on statin therapy"

Hardly a case for those of us without diastolic heart failure to panic?

I'll stay on them for the time being.
 
Yorksman said:
Later I was told I needed statins, by now the cheaper Simvastatin, because of my diabetes and most recently because of my Microalbuminuria. It must be a wonderful drug to be so versatile. Personally I find whisky to be very good for lifting the mood and making troubles seem more remote and less worrying but fortunately, I am aware of its side effects.
Click to expand...

It was simvastatin that caused the serious side effects I suffered, while at the same time failed miserably to control my cholestrol levels which went sky high. i changed to atorvastatin in oct last year because the doctor considered it too dangerous for me to go to the 80mg dose. i'm on 40mg atorvastatin. Side effects stopped almost straight away.
 
Question any one who tries to force me to take medicine while I've not been convinced of its safety or necessity. I'm sure you must have read all the conflicting and confusing reports and that makes me feel that as my levels are only around 6.3 I will wait until I'm satisfied they're okay for me.

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