More Bad News On Statin Drugs

As mentioned in previous posts concerning statin drugs, I weaned myself off both Lipitor and Tricor some years ago. i was on BOTH for cholesterol until i started researching them and found out they were bad alone and worse taken together. I have never regretted coming off both and never looked back.

Here is an article by Blue Heron Health news which I subscribe to that I thought you might find interesting. IF you are on statins, I recommend you do some additional research and take a hard look at the side effects of statin drugs and work with your doctor to discover other ways of reducing your risk of heart attack, stroke etc.

1. “The Lord is gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger and great in mercy. The Lord is good to all, and His tender mercies are over all His works.” (Psalm 145:8)
2. “The Lord is good; His mercy is everlasting …” (Psalm 100:5)

Dan

http://blueheronhealthnews.com/site/?p=6065

EXCERPTS:

Posted on October 2, 2012 by Scott Davis

For years, statins have by far been the most prescribed drugs in the world. And there seems to be no stop to it.
Some doctors even want every single person over the age of 50 to be forced to take statins, whether or not they actually have high cholesterol or blood pressure levels.
On the naturally-focused side, we know that the two most important things needed to manage cholesterol levels are to eat healthy and exercise. This raises good cholesterol and lowers bad.
However recently, studies have been showing side effects that may prevent you from using natural methods if you’re on statins; therefore, contradicting the whole purpose of them.
It’s been known for a long time that known side effects of statins include muscle aches and fatigue. But they differ in how badly they affect people.
To investigate this, researchers in Strasbourg, France, fed statin drugs to a group of rats. After two weeks, they compared the endurance and strength by comparing medicated and non-medicated rats on treadmills.
No big surprise was waiting for them. The medicated rats became exhausted much sooner and couldn’t run as far or as fast as the non-medicated group.
But the researchers didn’t stop there. They also discovered that the oxidative stress on skeletal muscles (way to measure potential cell damage) was 60% higher in the medicated rats than the non-medicated. That is for the rats that did NOT run.
It gets even worse. The medicated rats that were running had 226% more oxidative stress on the skeletal muscles than the rats that ran and were not medicated with statins.
The medicated running rats also had less capacity to store glycogen in the skeletal muscles, which is something necessary for anyone who wants to work out. Muscles’ inability to store glycogen can also lead to type 2 diabetes.
The conclusion is that working out while on statins is much more difficult and post- workout muscle recovery takes a much longer time.
For many people, it’s hard enough to pull yourself up from the couch and workout; medications getting in the way just add insult to injury.
Now the statin drugs are preventing patients from exercising, which is something that’s considered even more effective to balance cholesterol than statin drugs.
It’s like giving a lung cancer patient a drug in the form of a “healthy cigarette”!
Any drug that prevent, or make it more difficult for people with high cholesterol to eat healthy or workout automatically is in my mind more harmful than helpful, especially drugs that are taken for a long period of time like statins.
Sore muscles and lack of endurance and fatigue are only a few of many side effects statins produce. Recently they’ve been linked to memory loss, type 2 diabetes and more.
However, no big study has ever proven that using statins lowers the risk of dying from any condition except maybe for males who have already suffered one or more heart attacks.

(HERE ARE MORE DANGERS OF Lipitor and Tricor together)

http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/sepp/2004/01/31/lipitor_the_human_cost.htm

EXCERPTS:

By Melissa Siig, Tahoe World Staff

At first glance, Tahoe City resident Doug Peterson looks like he is recovering from a stroke.
His speech is slurred, he has difficulty walking in a straight line, and he can't sign his own name. By afternoon, he is so fatigued he has to sit down for the rest of the day. When asked his age, Peterson says he is 52. His wife Karla, standing nearby, corrects him. He is 53.
Doug has never had a heart attack, and until the onset of the symptoms almost three years ago, was an active skier, biker and scuba diver. Now he is limited to walks on the treadmill. Doug traces his problems to a drug he started taking almost three years before his health began deteriorating - Lipitor. Two other Tahoe City locals have also experienced negative side effects from taking Lipitor or other statins, the name for a family of cholesterol-fighting pills.
While there is no concrete evidence linking Doug's health problems to Lipitor, after doing years of research, meeting with doctors and talking to other statin sufferers all over the world online, he and Karla are convinced of the connection. Pfizer, the maker of Lipitor, claims the drug is effective in lowering cholesterol and has minor side-effects. But as Doug and others would ask, is it worth it?

WONDER DRUG OR DANGEROUS PILL?
Doug, who has hereditary high cholesterol, was first prescribed Mevacor, a statin made by Merck, in 1998. Six months later, his doctor had him switch to Lipitor, which comes in higher doses, and upped his dosage from 10 to 20 mg. His cholesterol dropped from 285 to a low of 160.
"The doctor was very pleased," said Doug, "but meanwhile the symptoms started."
In the fall of 2000, Doug began having restless sleep patterns. His twitching and flying arms got so bad that Karla had to sleep in another room. One time, Doug even fell out of bed. The couple didn't think anything was seriously wrong until a few months later when Doug started slurring his words. This was followed by a loss of balance and the beginning of what Doug calls the "statin shuffle" - a slow, wobbly walk across a room. Next to slide was Doug's fine motor skills. It took him five minutes to write four words, much of which was illegible. Finally, he tired easily and his cognitive memory processing diminished. He had trouble following books with complex plots.
Confounded by Doug's illness, over the next two years the Petersons traveled all over California meeting with neurologists, internists and acupuncturists. Doug had MRIs, brain scans and neurofeedback tests done. Last February, Doug's doctor suggested he go off Lipitor to see if the drug was causing his health problems. After three weeks, the symptoms persisted, so the doctor put Doug back on the pill. Since Doug wasn't exhibiting the most common side effect, muscle cramps, and his liver function tests came back normal, the physician was doublly sure that Lipitor was not to blame.
Finally, last spring, a doctor in Pasadena suggested Lipitor could be the culprit. Doug went off the drug in May, and since then his symptoms have stopped their downward spiral and his health has slowly started to improve. According to Karla, his mind is sharper, his balance is better and his speech is more clear in the mornings, before he gets tired. But he still has a long way to go.
"Before, I was a good father and family person," said Doug, who has two children with Karla. "At this point, I can't do that much."
A former Navy diver and owner of Sierra Tahoe Computers, a repair and service business, Doug has had to cut down his work schedule because of his fatigue and loss of hand coordination. He is considering going on disability, but Karla remains optimistic.
"We are hoping he is going to get better. That's our number one goal," she said. "Anger is a waste of energy at this point. We are trying to recover and get the word out."