Let talks about statins

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My personal experience is the muscle aches and insomnia goes away within a week after stopping. Different statins seemed to have different effects initially but ended up about the same. Zocor seemed to be particulary hard on joints and feet. Lipotor was not as bad on joints but real effective as a way of not sleeping. Crestor got dumped within a week due to insomnia so I am not sure what other side effects were associated with it. It was represented to me that there are various generations of drugs with each new one having less side effects, of course that corelates with drugs going off patent and newer drugs still being on patent so far more profitable.

A couple of "by the ways"

Red yeast rice is pushed as an alternative to statins, it in theory produces natural statins which may have been effective against cholesterol. Unfortunately, the FDA got involved at some point and had the producers change the way they produce it to limit production of statins so the product didnt become a drug and therefore regulated. It also has the reputation of very poor quality control (as it is a supplement and unregulated) so each package may contain varying potency.

Something not discussed is "plant stanols esters" they are an extract of plants. The major source for them is a pulp mill byproduct (as a pulp mill by nature processes lots of plants) They lower cholesterol, one product that has them are benecol margarine. They also can be obtained as a byproduct of soybean production.

Niaspan or the over the counter SloNiacin takes care of the flushing for 95% of the time for me, but when it doesnt work the flushing is noticable on the dose I have.
 
From the reading I have done, red rice yeast has the same active ingredient as a statin so it has the same side effect profile. The body ramps up production of cholesterol at night so its best to take the evening. You should not drink grapefruit juice while taking a statin because it affects the enzyme that processes the statin.
 
daxs said:
The cardiac CRP, at least in my geographic area of practice, is not a commonly ordered test. I do not think evidence based medicine is on board with this test yet.
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I guess they're standard here. My normal physical blood work has the CRP results, 0.9 mg/L, which is less than 1.0 which is low risk.

Lots of good input here, daxs. Thanks.
 
its just the stuff I tell my patients on a daily basis. along with lose weight, exercise and eat a ow fat diet. I think I get ignored alot. lol
 
peakbagger said:
My personal experience is the muscle aches and insomnia goes away within a week after stopping. Different statins seemed to have different effects initially but ended up about the same. Zocor seemed to be particulary hard on joints and feet. Lipotor was not as bad on joints but real effective as a way of not sleeping. Crestor got dumped within a week due to insomnia so I am not sure what other side effects were associated with it. It was represented to me that there are various generations of drugs with each new one having less side effects, of course that corelates with drugs going off patent and newer drugs still being on patent so far more profitable.
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I cannot tell you how happy and grateful I am that you shared all this.
The last thing I want to take is a med that will give me insomnia. As I got older I developed problems sleeping which seem to be helped by taking Melatonin.
I don't think our bodies are meant to have perfect numbers in our declining years. The big question is ever present. Is the cure worse than the disease? Too often the answer is yes. I look at in now as "it's not about quantity but quality". When I take a moment to read the obits in our town paper, many or those listed are in my age group. When I ponder this I realize that every day is a gift.
Had I listened and believed every dire warning that was given me over the years I should be dead now. No doubt about it. Maybe I am living on borrowed time.

One of the big ones was HRT replacement. In spite of their valiant effort to convince me to take this, I held my ground and much to their growing dismay and displeasure, I refused it. Why would I take a drug that they could not be certain would not give me cancer? In the end, I made a very wise decision.

It takes years to determine the good, the bad, the ugly of drugs. They are approved for human consumption but we are now the testing ground for statins. There are so many and eventually all the data will be in. At this time, I do not wish to donate my body to science.
Would I rather have heart disease than Alzeihmers? (+family hx) No doubt about it. "It's not about the number of breaths you take, but the moments that take your breath away. " If I am sitting on the couch with leg pain, and exhausted from the statin induced lack of sleep, how am I to enjoy all the moments that "take my breath away"? I have the same personal negative feelings about these drugs that I had about HRT's. Two women I met who were doing swim therapy told me they were there because of severe leg pain and diminshed ability to move about. They had complained time after time to their MD's and were told it was not the statins but the aging process. It had been months and they were still trying to regain full mobility. They both had to quit their jobs and they needed that money.
The devil you know is sometimes better than the devil you don't know.

We see drugs taken off the market because of serious adverse effects and others that are labeled with dire warnings. Everyone must reach their own conclusions when taking meds that are still relatively "new". For the time being I will go on happily annoying my PCP.
I don't think she really believes half of what she tells me anyway. It's all part of the marketing process.

Molly also enjoys the many "moments that take her breath away"!

IMG_0170.jpg
 
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daxs said:
From the reading I have done, red rice yeast has the same active ingredient as a statin so it has the same side effect profile.
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Just a slight clarification: all statins work by the same mechanism of action, however each statin (6 or so currently available) has a different chemical structure and consequently acts slightly differently in the body: potency may be different resulting in a different dose; the manner and rate at which it is metabolized may be different, resulting in a different dosing schedule - once daily vs. twice or three times daily; and the side effect profile can vary among different statins, though in practice I think most people have a similar reaction to any statin.

Peakbagger's synopsis of red yeast rice is spot on. I'll add just a little bit, as it's actually quite complicated: red yeast rice probably contains several different statins (i.e. different chemical structures, same mechanism of action). The first one that was identified, Mevastatin, was never sold due to adverse side effects. The second one that was identified, Lovastatin, was better-tolerated and was a blockbuster drug for Merck. Once the FDA learned that red yeast rice contained a substance that actually had a clinical effect, it stopped falling under the "supplement" umbrella, and had to be treated as a "drug." In the US, if you are going to sell a drug, you have to prove that the drug is effective through clinical trials, which is extremely expensive, and no "supplement" maker was willing to do that. The solution to this problem, for supplement makers, was to process the red yeast rice to remove the known drug substance, Lovastatin. As a result, you can again buy red yeast rice - it should contain little or no Lovastatin.

BUT - as mentioned above, red yeast likely contains several statins in addition to those that have been identified and tested in the clinic. So if you eat red yeast rice, even if you aren't getting any Lovastatin, you may be getting some other statin whose activity is not very well explored. For now, it is up to the idividual to decide if they prefer to take this "supplement," which is essentially unregulated by the FDA, at an unpredictable dose, with little or no reliable clinical data to say whether the stuff is good or bad. Or to stick with what is manufactured and distributed by drug companies, which likely costs more money (although almost all statins are now off patent and cheap), can be dosed consistently, and for which adverse side effects are well documented. Or, of course, to address the problem in another manner.
 
daxs said:
its just the stuff I tell my patients on a daily basis. along with lose weight, exercise and eat a low fat diet. I think I get ignored alot. lol
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Daxs, you get ignored because most folks just want to pop a pill and keep on watching TV while stuffing their faces with high fat, high salt fluff. Passive care.


In spite of gazzillions of dollars spent on research and "research" and in spite of the ab-so-lute-ly phenomenal number of theories, weirdo beliefs and urban legends regarding health floating around out there (copper bracelet anyone?) all we can offer patients regarding "lifestyle" is to eat 5 portions of fruits and veggies (and we don't even really know why) stop smoking (duh!), exercise regularly and lose weight. That's it, that's all. This is hardly surprising when you stop and think that our species has genes that code for no less than 40,000 different proteins. To think that consuming a "statin" is actually going to make a difference in one's longevity and QOL (quality of life) is a great example of pharmaceutically controlled, media-driven naivety and magic thinking. Besides the cholesterol racket lets not forget to obsess over our blood sugar and blood pressure.

Stick with those fruits and veggies, go hiking, don't smoke, fasten your seat belt and enjoy to the very utmost your four score and five (if you get ten then you chose your parents, not your druggist, well).
 
daxs said:
its just the stuff I tell my patients on a daily basis. along with lose weight, exercise and eat a ow fat diet. I think I get ignored alot. lol
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Do you know why many older people gain weight? My theory is that Mother Nature knows that many are reluctant to do their weight baring exercises so adds the pounds so they will. :p
 
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erugs said:
Do you know why many older people gain wait? My theory is that Mother Nature knows that many are reluctant to do their weight baring exercises so adds the pounds so they will. :p
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It is my understanding that we are biased to eat just a bit more than necessary. This served us well back in the days when food could be scarce and something else usually killed us at an earlier age, however now* that exercise is optional, food is plentiful, famines are rare, and many earlier causes of death have been reduced it is to our detriment.

*This only applies to certain parts of the current world, eg North America.

Doug
 
erugs said:
Do you know why many older people gain weight?
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Another factor is that for many of us our metabolism slows down as we age. So, if you don't adjust your caloric intake when that occurs, those now excess calories will be stored as fat.
 
I get the weight gain question all the time along with the protests I eat healthy and exercise. So you ask them to bring in a food and exercsie diary. It usually shows they are NOT eating healthy and exercising. I remember pointing out to someone that chicken wings were not a good choice. But its chicken was the response! sigh . Everyone blames their thyroid. That's rarely the cause. Part of the problem today is portions. They are huge. People also tend to eat alot of processed food which is high in fat and calories. Has anyone else noticed that cheese is in almost everything? thats a high calorie food. People aso tend to drink too much juice and energy drinks with can be high in sugar.

I agree Neil. Many people would rather take a pill to control their BP, cholesterol, diabetes. Its easier to be lazy and stuff your face with crappy food.
 
A follow up on this, after seeing a show on PBS I was intrigued by the 5-2 Diet concept and its effect on cholesterol. Unfortunately the video on exercise and eating by Michael Moseley are no longer available anywhere. I figured what the heck give it a month. After three weeks, I had a blood test. I got the results, a substantial reduction in LDL. Even with my marginal HDL, my ratio was on the healthy side. Basically best numbers I had in over ten years. Better numbers than when I was on any statin. I dont have blood sugar issues so I dont think they even tested for it, but apparently this approach also has a signficant impact on folks who are borderline diabetics. A nice side effect is some weight loss. Buy the book if you want to but really its pretty darn simple. 600 (500 for women) calories a day two days a week, eat normal the other days. On the "fast" days, eat two meals AM and PM or just one in the evening and limit snacking. You will figure out pretty quickly that junk food and carbs burns up calories quick, so healthier low fat food means more volume. That is about 4 pages of the book and the first couple of chapters is why it works and the potential results and the last chapters are ways to dole out the 600 calories. They really dont comment about diet soda or artificial sweeteners, I personally avoid them as they are reported to fake the body into thinking its getting a sugar fix, but I guess its up to someone to do some more research.

I expect that this is not really going to get hyped in the US media significantly as no one is making much of a buck on it. No special meals or need for counselors. Plus the overall flexibility and lack of detailed rules makes its too simple. Heck I expect someone could write an Iphone app but thats about it.

Some caveats, I would not want to have to be around other folks eating normally on the "fast days". It would be far to easy to "break the calorie bank". I just have a list of projects around the house or I go for a walk during lunch. I am a technical person so I dont mind getting analytical with a gram scale two days a week figuring out how I will split up 600 calories a day as long as I can do what I want the other days . I do like that I can move the days around. I found that the day after a fast I am not that particulary hungry and dont compensate for the fast day before. Unlike eating calories restricted every day, I find that I dont get the perpetual "hungries".

Heck it may be a wicked placebo effect and one blood test doesnt have a lot to statistical significance but I can hope its a trend. So caveat emptor to all and I see if I can make it 6 months to my next test.
 
peakbagger said:
Heck it may be a wicked placebo effect and one blood test doesnt have a lot to statistical significance but I can hope its a trend. So caveat emptor to all and I see if I can make it 6 months to my next test.
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That's great news, p/b. I'm doing more of a reverse 5/2 to yours. Low carb and low fat as much as I can adhere to it - lots of veggies, fish and poultry, including eggs. Minimal heavy fats and carbs. It's working well for me so far.

My logic -
1. I like the thinking in Dee McCaffrey's The Science of Skinny - she advocates eating whole, out of the ground food with minimal processing and no poly-syllabic synthetic chemicals.

2. I have done well in the past with low carb regimes and think the anti-carb logic is well-reasoned, especially processed sugars and other sweets as well as flours and starches.

3. I think Dr. Atkins was full of b.s., though, that you need to eat a lot of fat to get the fat-burning engine going. I think the tasty fatty foods in his diet were the selling point and not dietarily necessary. I think some consumption of wholesome fats and oils is called for, but if you're about losing weight, if you limit calories, the body will resort to burning its fat stores.

Results: it's early days, about a week and a half in, but it seems workable and I am shedding pounds. Feeling pretty good, too. Will be tracking it to see how it agrees with me going forward. Good luck to you, as to me!
 
peakbagger said:
A follow up on this, after seeing a show on PBS I was intrigued by the 5-2 Diet concept and its effect on cholesterol.
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I had no idea that this actually was a proven diet plan! I decided on my own to only have one meal per day in the evening as my New Year's Resolution to lose weight although I'm doing this 5 days a week versus the two. I'm probably having more than 600 calories per day because I also snack at night and have some wine; but that being said, I've lost ten pounds.
 
You might even do better if you moved that one meal to earlier in the day, if that's practical. Lots of evidence seems to suggest that eating the bulk of your nutrition earlier (like lunchtime) helps with weight loss. (Anecdotally, professional Sumo wrestlers gain weight by eating large meals just before bedtime.) And I have often seen the statement "Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a pauper" as weight loss advice. YMMV, obviously.
 
TCD said:
You might even do better if you moved that one meal to earlier in the day, if that's practical. Lots of evidence seems to suggest that eating the bulk of your nutrition earlier (like lunchtime) helps with weight loss. (Anecdotally, professional Sumo wrestlers gain weight by eating large meals just before bedtime.) And I have often seen the statement "Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a pauper" as weight loss advice. YMMV, obviously.
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I read that it's good to eat earlier to get the metabolism going which is the most common critique of my approach. I don't recommend it to anyone; I'm just happy to have been able to stick to this current plan. My long term goal is to do what you suggest.
 
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