Re: Anyone else have (or had) side-effects from statin use?

I decided to go down the low fat diet route, rather than take statins again.

Some people do have naturally high cholesterol, no matter what their diet.

Re: Anyone else have (or had) side-effects from statin use?

Statins is something that makes me angry and I am normally a very
cool person.
My Doctor told me years ago that everyone over 50 should take
statins and even though the blood test showed no abnormalities
in the cholesterol I said I would try them.
I took my first one at night time and after a hour in bed I started to feel
really ill. My throat started closing up and I kept having to drink
water to keep my throat open. I decided I would go to sleep and
would either be dead or alive in the morning. I woke up with pins
and needles in my right arm and stiffness and I thought I had a
stroke. I went back to the Docs that day and took the tablets back
and basically in not a rude way told her where to stick them.
She had forgotten about this episode and even now keeps saying
I should be on statins. This is 10 years after the first and only tablet.
My blood still shows not high cholesterol.
They have targets to keep up to and they get money for certain tablets.
Its the same as the pushing of the once off injection for pneumonia they
got targets for that too even though if you read about it there is no
evidence it works on over 65's. So I try not to go to my Docs a lot as
I feel as though I am sometimes in a sales room not a Doctors.

Knowing someone else with high cholesterol. My friends husband had
a cholesterol count of 11. He was told to change his diet and given
the statins. He managed to get it down to the count of 8. He also
had the bad muscle cramps and not feeling well. He came off them too
as the Doc said that his normal cholesterol was inherited and no amount
of statins would bring it down. He now feels better.

They may be good for some people but quite obviously if they are not
doing you any good then I think you should take your chances without them.
I too would rather be dead if I couldn't walk so I try and keep myself
healthy and then one day hey I will die like everyone else.

Re: Anyone else have (or had) side-effects from statin use?

Good post BowieEyes ... and I totally agree ... and I have refused statins and the flu jab too

Re: Anyone else have (or had) side-effects from statin use?

Just to please nursie at my local health centre, I tried Simvastatin. Gave me stomach cramps and nobody told me that you couldn't have grapefruit or its derivatives (possibly also Seville oranges) while taking them.

Tried Atorvastatin. Gave me headaches, but I went back to see GP for a repeat. Saw a locum GP who said that if they were giving me problems, just to stop taking them, adding "Anyway, your cholsterol level isn't really bad". (It was 6 before starting)

Without wanting to sound like a conspiracy theorist, I think there is a lot of pressure from the big drug companies to unnecessarily prescribe these drugs.

Re: Anyone else have (or had) side-effects from statin use?

Of course I have. I don't do things like that without telling my doctor. I haven't seen her face to face, but we have an online patient portal where we can communicate with our doctors and she got back to me yesterday and told me to try niacin and fish oil. Well, I'm already taking fish oil, been taking it for years and I just recently started a B complex vitamin that has 25 mg of niacin in it. I don't know if that's enough to make a difference on cholesterol levels, but I've done reading on niacin in the past as well and it sounds rather dangerous to me, if you take it in high levels. So I don't think I'll be upping that dose.

I need to lose weight. Period. I'm not drastically overweight, but I could definitely stand to lose about 20 pounds which, in the past, made a difference in my cholesterol. I realize I'm older now and my body doesn't work as efficiently as it used to, but dropping a few pounds may help some.

And great posts, everyone, I too agree that some drugs, especially these, are over-prescribed.

Re: Anyone else have (or had) side-effects from statin use?

Yes indeed..losing weight can have an impact on many health issues.

Re: Anyone else have (or had) side-effects from statin use?

I am puzzled by this statement BowieEyes..

The pneumococcal vaccine prevents serious blood, brain, and lung infections from the Streptococcus pneumoniae bacteria these infections are called pneumococcal disease -they also include pneumonia, meningitis, and septicemia.

Pneumococcal disease is a serious health threat that can lead to death, many strains of Streptococcus pneumonia are resistant to antibiotics.
Infection with the bacteria is a leading cause of serious illness in adults and children worldwide.

Vaccination is the best way to prevent pneumococcal disease the adult vaccine protects against 23 strains of Streptococcus pneumoniae.

Re: Anyone else have (or had) side-effects from statin use?

Must admit I had the vaccination two years ago now and it seems to have been best thing I could have done stopped the constant chest infections I was getting every winter. I would recommend it to people as like the flu jab it isn't a live vaccine so can't catch anything from it. Don't know about over 60s though as I haven't quite got there yet.

Re: Anyone else have (or had) side-effects from statin use?

Agreed. At my highest weight, after I had my son, my cholesterol and blood pressure were up. I weighed nearly 16 stone. I changed my eating habits (what and how much I ate) and slowly, over time, dropped almost 6 stone of that weight. My blood pressure as well as my cholesterol came down to normal ranges. But now that I've put some of that weight back on, both have gone up again.

Re: Anyone else have (or had) side-effects from statin use?

Absolutely Julie...very good advise.