18 year old with FH prescribed statins - any thoughts?

[StrugglingMum]

Hi Peeps

My husband has kindly passed on the FH to our daughter (son is fine..) and we saw the lipid specialist at Barts at the beginning of May.

She also has low thyroid and we are seeing the endocrinologist also at Barts, next week.

So we received the letter from the Cholesterol doc and she is suggesting that my 18 year old is started on Atorvostatin 20mg increasing to 40mg in a month; which I think is a bit hefty, especially as she doesn’t have a follow up until January.

My husband suffers with a lot of side effects and can only tolerate Rosuvastatin... he refused to take the tablets for years until he had a TIA at 55.

I don’t know if anyone has any experience or advice... I am currently waiting until after we’ve seen the Endo as I know the two are linked to see if an increase in her thyroxine will bring the Cholesterol down first.

What do you think?

[sandybrown]

Starting point HeartUK.

Cholesterol helpline

0345 450 5988

Monday – Friday 10am–3pm

[e-mail]

Heart UK has fully qualified nurses who can offer you help.

[StrugglingMum in reply to sandybrown]

Thank you - I will give them a call.

[StrugglingMum]

Thanks - I don’t have the full read out (will get them from Endo next week and post on here.

In the letter it stated -

Total Cholesterol 8.5

LDL 6.6

Triglycerides 0.8

Her high Cholesterol was picked up during one of the many blood tests following the low thyroid diagnosis. And as her Dad has FH (he has had genetic testing) it was assumed that she had inherited.

[StrugglingMum]

I know - but that was just on the letter from the hospital.

They have her on the list for genetic testing but say they don’t have funding at the moment!!!

Thanks for your help - it has definitely raised a few more questions.

I will get the full print out next week.

[sandybrown]

Please take look at the information onthis link.

assets.publishing.service.g...

[Marz]

I think it is mentioned on the NHS website that the thyroid should be optimally treated before Statins are considered. ( not that the NHS have much idea about optimal treatment for thyroid - from my reading ! ) In days gone by and before thyroid testing came to pass - anyone with raised cholesterol had their thyroids treated

Your husbands TIA could have been caused by raised Homocysteine which can be a better marker for heart events and strokes. Rarely tested in the NHS - ummm ? Lowering Homocysteine can also lower cholesterol - happened in my case ! Homocysteine is often raised - along with MMA when B12 is low in the cells. So testing would be helpful of - B12 - Folate - Ferritin and VitD both for daughter and hubby.