Sensible Reasons Why They are Stupid Medicine

New summary article from two of my favorite cholesterol writers, responding to the UK announcement to change statin treatment guidelines following the controversial AHA guidelines.



http://healthinsightuk.org/2014/02/...tupid-medicine/

After I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, I was put on a statin ( among other drugs). My doc said he puts ALL diabetics on one even if they do not have high cholesterol.

Maybe we should give all diabetics insulin. So what if they can control with diet alone.

I told MD I will not take statins, small debate followed. I stood my ground.

But: Last lab tests: total chol 228, trig 62, hdl 80, ldl 135.6; all the ratios are
in the ideal range

Call from nurse, MD wants me on 10 mg statins, I picked up the prescription and am not taking it.

I have to find a different MD!

Been transitioning into LC/HF, 8 years ago it took 3 months to normalize blood work.

Those are good numbers, barely above recent recommendations, unless your doctor is following those crazy new AHA guidelines. Just about every man over a certain age, BMI, and every diabetic 40-75 gets a statin with those.
Most physician practices have standards of care which must be met, or the doctor gets in trouble with insurance, hospital and licensing reviews, etc. If you like your doctor for other reasons, what you do with the prescription is your decision.

Much I don't agree with here, but details on the new guidelines and supporting advice from the AHA. http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/Condi...155_Article.jsp
Check out the Myth vs Truth article. Methinks the AHA doth protest too much.
Especially since much of the criticism came from doctors and researchers who specialize in heart disease.

My husband quit taking statins 4 months ago, after being on them since 1995. He just got a "concerned" letter from his Medicare insurer asking why he isn't taking his statins! Apparently they get worried if you miss a refill. The letter instructed him to call his doctor immediately.

We both got quite a laugh from it. He is planning on going to to the doctor soon for another issue, but we know the dreaded cholesterol subject will come up. He's learned a lot about the subject in the last 6 months, so he's quite comfortable with telling the doctor that he will not take statins again.

I played around with the new US calculator and could not get it to recommend statins (oh, darny!) until I put in age of 75 or so. I even put in my highest blood pressure reading, which my drs consider a bit high, and my 'worst' cholesterol numbers. Still couldn't get the risk much over 2%. Odd, maybe I'm Immortal Woman. I totally believe this new algorithm is making more people eligible for these meds, but I'm just confused how. Was more 'eligible' for statins before the new guidelines.

Dr. Kendrick played around with the British version:
http://drmalcolmkendrick.org/2013/1...statin-by-date/

Article by Dr. Briffa on "Shared Decision Making" about a Mayo Clinic article on how to present the benefit vs risk information for statins.
http://www.drbriffa.com/2014/02/28/...ing-considered/

The article by Dr. Ting from Mayo: http://blog.cardiosource.org/post/s...patient-choice/

Well, I just posted over in the atkins forum about this - sort of. I got my numbers today, been basically 4 months since u started. My triglycerides dropped from 530 to 145, total cholesterol dropped from 204 to 154, hdl same at 24, LDL up to 115 from 77, doc says he wants that under 70. I'm on simvustatin, and he wants me to up it to 20 mg/day. From what I read here, my numbers sound okay??

You couldn't pay me to take them. So dangerous...

What's the alternative then? Having triglycerides over 500 can't be that great either I would think.

Very true, but statins don't lower triglycerides. Eating low carb lowers triglycerides and it does it swiftly as you have seen. Changes in cholesterol are much slower.

It appears your doctor hasn't read the new guidelines. "Bad cholesterol is no longer the main factor guiding treatment" LDL Doesn't enter into the new guidelines until over 190. So why does he want your LDL under 70? And exactly as Liz wrote, eating low carb drops the Trigs...yours have done very well in only four months! HDL will also respond to LC, but much more slowly and yours is still quite low. Ideally, you want a Trig/HDL ratio under 2 but with continued low carb, high fat eating, Trigs will drop further and HDL will start to move up. (There is some controversy that statins have no impact, or maybe even lower, the good cholesterol!)

From Cholesterol Clarity, to raise HDL naturally, one of the best ways is to consume more dietary fat, inc. healthy saturated fats, such as coconut Oil, butter, full-fat meats, and mono oils like olive oil. additionally HDL responds to regular exercise, reduced alcohol consumption, and if you are up to it, intermittent fasting of 16 hours. Recommend reading this book if some of these denser articles and websites about statins are confusing. Did you watch the excellent two part Australian documentary about cholesterol and statins.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAKaM330xzg. This is the part on statins..the first part on cholesterol in the side bar.


Unless you already have heart disease, I believe the benefits are limited, but these new guidelines would still likely "get you" due to your weight. Did you plug your numbers into the calculator?

Didn't give a reason for being under 70, so I don't know. And yeah, exercise is all I've ever heard that will raise hdl. Haven't seen the calculator, is there a link or something, think I missed that.

Here are the new OFFICIAL guidelines. See infographic and go through links to details of each risk factor.
http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/Condi...155_Article.jsp

The calculator: https://www.heart.org/gglRisk/main_en_US.html or
http://tools.cardiosource.org/ASCVD-Risk-Estimator/
Edit: These are only for ages 40-79 (didn't know you are only 36)

Read Dr. Ting's article how the decision should be SHARED.
http://blog.cardiosource.org/post/s...patient-choice/