I’m amazed at the content in this, and the amount of medical back up links the article has!
I thought UK rate of death from heart and circulatory disease had gone down, but apparently it’s gone up!!!
( reported BHF May 2019)
More controversial news published - British Heart Fou...
More controversial news published
Written by
Adaboo
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54 Replies
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Hmmm. Definitely food for thought. My GP suggested I might want to half the dose of my statin, due to the side effects. I have been weighing up the pros and cons. Think I will now.
Food for thought, definately!
It’s really scary I think.
I didnt find it scary. Hopefully the investigation into statins will produce useful and reliable information so we can make better decisions about our healthcare. It may be that cholesterol is not the culprit but until research can find better cures we can only follow advice with the knowledge currently available. It is not surprising there is more deaths from heart disease. We are fatter and more sedentary than previous generations.
The last report I saw that said numbers were increasing was correct numerically but not statistically (percentage) as the population has increased. For instance 10 is more than 5 but both 5 in a 100 and 10 in 200 are 5%!
I agree we are fatter ( not personally 😅) and lazier but if all these drugs were doing their jobs surely there would be a whole lot less deaths with soooooo many people prescribed them.
Perhaps the drugs are doing their job! There's a lot of debate about patients expecting their doctor to give them a pill which will be the panacea to their condition without them being required to do anything -loose weight, get active stop smoking, cut down on drinking, change diet etc.
All the medics I've encountered since being diagnosed with heart failure have made it quite clear to me that the medicines I've been given will not on their own be enough to give me a good quality of life and that I need to make changes to my whole lifestyle to give myself a chance of having a good quality of life. Heart failure cannot be reversed, but it's progress can be slowed with the right medicine and the right attitude and approach of the patient.
Now if people won't take on board the message that they have a part to play in their health and that no medicine on it's own is going to save them in the long run, the number of deaths will continue to increase.
Couldn’t agree more with that. Exercise and eating clean and no sugar or processed food I believe is the way to go. Folk are lazy and do want a magic pill, just didn’t expect that pill to maybe harm folk though.
If all they do is take the drugs, but carry on with their unhealthy lifestyles and habits then there is NO magic pill, statin or otherwise. One weird one was something I was talking to a cardiac nurse with on Monday - my dad, 78, smoked until he was late 50s, overweight most of his life, his mum and dad both died early from heart attacks. Other than a smidge of LBBB which is just basically the wiring getting a bit old, his heart is fine. He has always been active but not cardio exercise. The cardiac nurse said they’re doing a lot of research around the ‘healthy obese’.
I think genes are going to be the biggest baddy, and the majority of those who do not adjust their diet and activity to suit the decreased movement modern life leads to will be looking at one of the CVD gang of illnesses, or more.
Yes like all drugs that we are pushed into taking I am not surprised it normally fuelled by money !!
I for one have refused to take statins even though I was recommenced to take them by my surgery.
After routine blood tests & a meds review which showed lower than average cholesterol levels , I was still offered statins ! I politely refused thinking why on earth would I want to pump more chemicals into my body without good reason?
It's about time all drugs which have not had their raw data divulged to be peer reviewed should not be licensed until they do. It's obvious that drug companies who have spent millions on producing a drug will slant the results in their favour - they want to make money. GPs do not have time to go through all the background of drug trials for every illness but specialists/consultants should be doing that.
PPIs also need major investigation and a prescribing rethink!
Fascinating reading. Thank you for taking the time to post it. My money is on too much sugar/insulin resistance/pre-diabetes/ diabetes/clogged up arteries/obesity/ severely clogged up arteries/heart attack/66% chance of random, instant death.
However the behaviour of drug companies in directly causing the deadly opioid epidemic recently revealed in the American courts reveals a callous disregard for anything except their profits.
Scary - yes. Another example of media manipulation and use of marketing budgets to suppress any independently verified evidence.
I have been undergoing a series of liver function tests and it could be Statins are the culprit!!
I just long for some clear, evidence-based advice rather than having to choose between competing groups who are putting forward their own theories.
So the truth is that statins along with stents don't work or prolong life.
This along with bypassing is modern medicines way of combating heart disease and it appears pretty useless.
If you believe these reports it seems that once you develop heart disease your stuffed!
I have a stent and am still alive so I believe they do work and I will continue taking my statin as well.
I think the truth is that we don’t know the whole truth until the studies are released for peer reviewing.
in reply to fergusthegreat
A good point.
I don't have any faith in mainstream medicine after all these years.
There are astute, compassionate and highly well-formed doctors, both GPs and consultants, whose missions are "to put patients first". They were eventually forced to leave NHS run by their accountants.
I would be interested to find out the number of elderly patients, who died on the Cardiac operating theatre to have a scheduled bypass op. Those who are here on this hub did survive and good stories to tell others.
This happened to my in-law, who was in his late 80s, a former school headmaster, bled to death. His elderly wife was deeply traumatised, and a few other people I met commented what happened to their parent(s) and relatives with their cardic care - something similar (after years of being messed around by hospitals) and clearly deeply in shock and traumatised through the prolonged "ordeal".
I also know the delays in cancer diagnosis via direct contacts, it means, far more invasive ops or death. Sadly, in our age, this is not so unusual these days. After looking at posts on this hub over some time, delays in heart-related diagnosis seem like a prevailing trend. But it is likely you were lucky you got a diagnosis at long last, you could have only died sooner. I thought I was just being an "unlucky" one. But certainly, it was not the reality.
I have little interest in statin. How about epilepsy drugs? Or, psychiatric drugs commonly prescribed for unfortunate patients and younger children who may have had systemic diseases? After all, the mainstream medicine sticks a label (a diagnosis) and give prescriptions. That's their career. They don't deal with time-consuming endeavour as to how the disease occurred. It's not meant to be a research.
I also had a busy bro, who struggled with pain over the past several years. I do not remember how many times he went to see consultants. After all, he is also a med professional. That did not give him an early diagnosis for his cancer. In the end, he had to remove muscles, lymph nodes, nerves and practically everything beyond the site where cancer was finally found. It should not have been a rocket science. If consultants did listen and ran correct tests, it could well have been a simple diagnosis.
Why this story? Well, these drugs are easy to give away to put an end to "the complex problems" for patients as well as consultants. It's just an easy solution to cover up something far more complex. They rarely deal with anything "complex", it has to be easier to deal with so many patients all at once.
It seems patients would have to run their healthcare via research, exchanging info on a hub like this, whilst a consultant is likely uninterested in anything outside their comfort zone in their hectic clinics. "Do you wanna statin?" "Yeah, that would be nice, Doc. . "
Adaboo in reply to
Very well said! My sister in law had problems with her throat/ voice for almost 3 years, all the signs of cancer! Doctors tested for everything but!! She died last year of that cancer which had then spread too far, she died 8 months after diagnosis. She had been a nurse all her working life 😔
My father, his brother and their father all died prematurely from heart attacks caused by CVD. I was started on statins some years ago and got to a greater age before I developed angina. This ultimately led to a bypass last year. So in my mind they do work and I will continue to take them. With stents and statins a former colleague went 20 years before he needed a bypass but he had other serious issues going on. Since the introduction of statins the average age of people having a bypass has gone up a decade!
in reply to MichaelJH
I know you are "pro-statin
as everyone can see.
It's useful to discern if it's a fixed belief (that many of us do have a strong tendency to have!) or not.
Nobody would dare say, your belief system is wrong.
It's something highly personal.
You decide. But if the same "vertical/simplistic logic" can be applied universally to others,
it's debatable. The body is a highly complex system.
New things are "discovered" and texts are re-written.
Whatever "medics" learned at Med School turned out to be
"grossly useless" in their ability to deliver a prompt diagnostic for major life-threatening diseases.
What have their learnt may already be obsolete.
Have they learnt some listening skills/art of old-school doctoring?
Or they just learned "how to protect yourself from potential litigations?" and focus mainly on "box-ticking" guideline compliance?
Premature deaths did happen in my family, too.
How about your mother's side?
Maybe, you were lucky to have the "protective genes"
from your
maternal side?
There are other factors, too.
Depression, alcohol dependency,
etc. that people tend not to discuss, openly.
What you are saying is that statin clearly didn't stop these CVDs progressing further to a point where bypass operations were "still needed".
So your point was, "statin helped to delay the progression" but eventually,
that wasn't enough. . .
It depends on how you would extrapolate the benefits of statin.
Knowing you're a happy-go-lucky "positive-thinking" or "fluffy" individual,
maybe, personality has something as to how you view statin even though
you had to have the major operation at a later time (?).
A lot has been found as to the disease etiology of CVDs and more
would be found in upcoming months/years.
'Knowing you're a happy-go-lucky "positive-thinking" or "fluffy" individual'
I will raise a glass of Merlot to that but not 100% about "fluffy"? 🍷😎
in reply to MichaelJH
Yes, you are!
The most pleasant quality on the hub when the subject can get "too serious".
One can learn so much from this hub and from people who can share their finds!
This hub did help me so much for the past few months.
Thank you.
Autumnsonnet
I am imagining Michael's ' fluffiness'
Does it involve slippers in anyway?
We do certainly need our load lightening from time to time. Humour and laughter can be an antidote to negativity.
in reply to Milkfairy
Oh...Absolutely, Milkfary!
Happy & positive Vibes.
Thanks to this superb hub, I had a decent chat with consultants
at a couple of clinics so far. . .
Results! 
I am intrigued are you able to tell us more about how you have achieved this?
I am glad you are making progress in accessing the care you need.
Excellent news indeed🤗
in reply to Milkfairy
Your compassionate words are much appreciated.
Your care/guidance, wisdom and positive attitude, of course, not to mention, other intelligent posters, sharing their "research'. 
Thank you, Milkfairy and all the other key posters, who think for all of us.
I hope you're doing well at the moment.
I want neither socks nor slippers for Christmas. The slippers would not fit the cool dude in shades persona! 😎
in reply to MichaelJH
Thank you Autumnsonnet for your kind words.
I am doing well but as they say Winter's coming!
I hope all is well with you.
Really intresting article.
I will always go for the same diet as Tony Royale when possible. The low carb high fat diet
I'm sick of all this low fat crap
I've gone back to my eggs milk small amounts of cheese and have my fish and veg and fruit.
I wish I was brave enough to come of statins one day.But even though I protested I was pushed into taking them because I had a 90%blockage in my LAD
Yet my cholesterol now looking back was never that high at all.
My BMI my metabolic age has gone down 10years as has my viceral fat etc etc and all since I've been back on full fat eggs milk etc
Hello ,
I just joined Health unlocked today. I signed up for the heart health and weightloss as both are concerns. I have not had a heart attack but my parents had and as I am over weight and approaching 40, I know I need to start caring about my health. I joined as I don't know much about staying heat healthy.
I am on the verge after trying so many weightloss low fat approaches (that I either didn't stick too or that bounced back) to stepping over to Low Carb High Fat ... but was worried about my heart health should I do so. Whats you opinion here?
Do you think the weightloss out weighs the risk if there are any risks. I'm not very clever in the area to be honest and I just read alot of 'fats not good for the heart' stuff.
Thanks
Debbie
See my answer to Rob above. I don’t know what diet is best as we are all individuals. I do think cutting out sugar and processed food is a good start though 🙂
Get a coronary CT scan. It will give a thorough image of the state of your arteries. Worth paying for yourself if not possible with Government socialised healthcare.
I have gone to low carb med fat. Carbs under 100 a day. My cholesterol was a bit high but after 3 months of that way of eating my ratio is now optimal and triglycerides are low. All other bloods came back healthy too. My metabolic age went to 53 after the 3 months too ( I’m 59) and visceral fat was 8 which is good. I also intermittent fast daily, no food after 7-8pm till 11-12 next day. I’m amazed how much my bloods, bmi etc changed in just 3 months when I feel so bad eating butter, cream etc.
Your viceral fat is excellent may I add
Mmm butter and cream all the good things in moderation and stuff this fake stuff.
It's funny because when I was using all the low fat crap and the so called flora sterol spread etc my cholesterol went down.
Bit after reading further research I stopped taking it and went back to butter milk eggs etc
Nd my cholesterol is still down...so?
Think I will stick to me eggs etc
Hi Rob, I agree with the Lchf diet. I have been following it for the last six months and have seen my fasting glucose drop from 5.3 to 4.8 so maybe I'm reducing some arterial inflammation if Ivor Cummings is correct.
How have you measured your visceral fat and metabolic age?
Another Ivor Cummings follower lol
Yes I too have been following him and strongly believe he's on to something. My problem is I have a high metabolism and lose weight quickly if I don't get enough calories like there are in carbs.But I've cut back considerably on them and try hard not to go to the sweetie cupboard.
I eat and awful lot of good fats though and keep my protein intake to chicken mainly along with things like chickpeas lentils pea protein etc
I regularly go to a wellness centre and stand on the machine that does the lot
I had a visceral fat of 14 when I was first diagnosed with heart disease
But to look at me you would never of said I had that high viceral fat
I'm now down to 11 and been told that is good bearing in mind anything below 12 is classed as normal.I would like to get it lower but due to an awful lot of heartache in my household at the moment I've been binge eating for comfort so need to re adress that soon or I will be on that slippery slop again
I also now suffer from microvascular angina and that is the real problem in my life at the moment because it causes me pain every single day.
Very scary too.Im on 40mg atorvastatin and would love to get off them because I've definitely become weaker and lots more pain in parts of body I never had.I just keep being told DO NOT stop taking them because there stabilising your plaque or you will have a heart attack! So because of that I've been scared into taking them permanently
What else can I do?
I'm in the same boat as you regarding the statins and am also on 40mg atorvastatin.
I have a few aches and pains but my muscle enzymes are OK so will continue with the statins although maybe at 20mg.
I deliberately avoid Dr Google and trust to the advice given to me by my real Doctor. However for the last few years I've suffered from pains in almost every part of my body. I've approached my GP on numerous times about this but each time they have avoided pointing a finger at my medication. After sheer desperation of continued muscle pain I stopped taking my Atorvastatin a few months ago and lo and behold I have no muscle pains! I am not anti medication in any way. I take all the other pills that were prescribed after my bypass. We need good independent research.
I agree Phil and am glad you have got rid of your aches and pains now. I do take medication but haven’t taken the statins.
I took prescribed dose of 80 mg daily of Atorvastatin for several months and my poor old body ached . I mentioned it to my Gp who immediately put me on to 40mg instead. Result lol I haven’t ached since.
MichaelJHHeart Star
Maybe they could start the Anti-Statin Party!
It was on sky news today or yesterday too, a cardiologist totally slating the way statins have been peddled with none of the studies even released! 😐
GPs - they do need better training in relable diagnostics.
Maybe, it's worth sending med students to med schools abroad to acquire
better diagnostic skills!
Who wasn't ever being "fobbed off" by dismissive GPs?
How many times you had to visit GPs over the years for one single issue,
left unresolved?
Many of us here are so lucky to still alive and tell the tales. . .
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