Is there any science/research showing how ineffective/bad statins are?

(Kent) #21

@Eppy, I know it has been many months since I posted my original question, but let me explain my motivation for asking the question in the first place. I was 58 years old (59 now) and had just had my very first visit to a cardiologist. I went not because I was having any problems or symptoms but because my GP doctor ( I am lucky I have a GP doctor that is very Keto friendly, in fact he eats that way himself) said that because my father had several cardiac events (first one occurred when he was in his mid 60’s) that it might be a good idea to see where I was at with my heart health. So, I went to a cardiologist that he recommended. Because I was a first time cardiac patient the doctor decided to run a normal battery of tests (stress test on a treadmill, blood tests, can’t remember what else now). I do remember that there were two things that stood out about that initial visit (even before I had completed any of the testing. First. when I asked about the Coronary Calcium Test that has been recommended by a number of the people in these forums as being a good indicator, she (the doctor) said it was worthless. I found that odd, but I noticed that when I asked her about any test or procedure, she would say they weren’t useful or they were worthless unless her office could perform that particular test/procedure. The second thing I noticed was during the initial visit before any tests were performed she started discussing putting me on a statin prescription. I mentioned to her that I thought it was inappropriate for her to be “prepping” me for a statin prescription when she hadn’t even seen the results from my tests. She very quickly got defensive.

On the second visit with the cardiologist (after all the tests were back) where she was going over the results of all the tests, she basically told me that I passed all the tests with flying colors and then proceeded to tell me that I should probably start taking a statin to keeps things in proper working order. In between visits I had started reading a kindle book by Dr. Duane Graveline, who as a Dr. himself has some fairly significant bad side effects while taking statins. When I mentioned side effects Dr. Graveline talks about in his book (The Dark Side of Statins) again the cardiologist got very defensive.

I posted the question in the Ketogenic forums, knowing that if there was research the awesome forum members would point me to it. And they did. Thank you @PaulL , @CarlKeller, @beccs, @Polly1, @MarkGossage and you as well @Eppy.

I also have a lot of respect for Dr. Peter Attia and listen to his podcast. His perspective, if I understand it correctly is that statins have a place in a fairly small number of cases.

As has been stated previously in this message thread. Everyone needs to take control of their own health and healthcare. If you feel that statins are helpful for you, then more power to you. From what I have researched (for the last year plus) I feel like statins may be helpful for some people but I am not one of them. And the side effects are extremely scary to me.

I also, ( a point that others have made in this thread) feel like from my experience, that Dr.'s often have a conflict of interest when it comes to prescribing statins. I am no expert at how the whole drug company / doctor relationship works but I was shocked at how eager and persistent my cardiologist was about wanting to prescribe a statin both before and after tests that gave no indication that they were needed by any stretch of the imagination.

#22

:flushed::roll_eyes:

I can’t stand these legal drug dealers. They’ll only help the complacent sheep.

Unlike @PaulL. I do believe that overeating on anything including cholesterol does pose health problems in the long run. No animal in nature has the luxury to eat breakfast, lunch and dinner with the caloric portions available today.

(Jack Bennett) #23

In one sense, “overeating” is by definition “eating too much”. And the only way we can gauge “too much” is by seeing some adverse effect. So this is kind of a tautology.

A more specific question: how much dietary cholesterol is too much?

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #24

As far as we know, the amount of dietary cholesterol has no effect on serum cholesterol levels. Even Ancel Keys admitted that, back in the 1950’s. It’s why he picked on saturated fat instead (since it is known to raise HDL).

It is possible to overeat, just as it is possible to undereat. The limit on undereating is death by starvation. The limit on overeating appears to be nausea and stomach rupture. But it is difficult to get even that far; there is a famous anecdote from one of the overfeeding studies done in the last century, in which one of the participants broke down and wept at the thought of having to eat one more pork chop (or something like that).

The notion of eating too much cholesterol is silly. Firstly, it’s not going to happen on a diet of whole, real foods. Second, given how useful cholesterol is in the body, I suspect it would take quite a lot to overload the body, even in pill form. Third, any substance necessary for life, such as water, can be toxic in too large a quantity. But the body has mechanisms to let us deal with it safely.

Taking water as an example, we have to be strongly motivated, in order to be able to drink enough water to disrupt our electrolytes and kill ourself, though people have done so. But, except for marathon runners under the influence of the propaganda from sports drink manufacturers, under normal circumstances a person is going to stop drinking before he or she has reached anywhere near too much water. Likewise, it’s not possible, under normal circumstances, to eat enough cholesterol-rich food to overwhelm our body with cholesterol.

(Jack Bennett) #25

I can imagine that a dozen eggs a day would be a “high” dietary cholesterol intake (>3000mg/d). At least by typical modern standards.

Is that “too much?” We’d have to run the experiment and find out.

(bulkbiker) #26

I guess youd need to ask the “egg fasters” if they have all suddenly dropped down dead?
I’ll guess if you get a response they’re probably ok. :grinning:

(Polly) #27

But just because they don’t reply doesn’t mean they aren’t OK, they might just be busy folk because when only eating eggs it is possible to fit so many more fun things into the day :grinning: