Atorvastatin

Hi,

   Make sure you take CQ10 which helps to combat the side effects of the

statins. The sciatica could be connected or  have no connection. I had sciatica long before taking statins.  Hopefully you've done a lot of reading of these pages. The answer could well be here.

Lea

One side effect is muscle weakness. Muscles have much to do in the treatment of sciatica which is a vertebrae issue. Don't know much else so I have no clue whether there is a connection. I have had sciatica for 40 years, It took me several years to understand how to manage it with the proper exercises, relaxation, proper and improper movements and motions. And yes during most of that time I was on statins. Your making me think now if the statins had a part to play in it????

What I have learned is that most doctors love to pass out pills often when they may not be needed by the patient. They benefit, you keep going back for me etc etc. I suggest that you research the hell out of this and make an informed decision. I just no longer trust doctors at all. They did not all graduate at the top of their class and some obviously were at the bottom! 

Try watching "Statin Nation" to start I think that it is on utube.

Good luck, Bill

The level of 4.6, is that total cholesterol? If it is why has your GP prescribed a statin? It's worth asking him/her, but be gentle, as in my experience GPs tend to be very touchy when questioned over their prescribing. I've had the 'another Daily Mail reader' treatment when I challenged my GP.

I have taken a range of statins trying to find one that didn't cause joint and muscle pain but failed (even had sciatica but not sure this was connected to statin).. I now have muscle wasting and peripheral neuropathy and have given up statins but too late to make a difference.

Please make a Yellow Card submission as the statin problem is under-reported

Always remember you hire the doctor,they dont hire you. Maybe a second opinion?

If 4.6 is your total cholesterol, your GP has guide lines to offer you statins, shoulde you be in the 'hig risk group', which is probably everybody over 65. They are aiming at a total level of not more than 4.0.

This in itself is a rather absurd yardstick, as it does not take into account your LDL ; HDL ratio or your total level v. HDL.

You do not have to take them, whatever your GP may say, if you think that they do not agree with you.

Hello... I took pravastin for bout a month.... Had an sometimes acute, sometimes mild pain in my right side.  Doc said was not related.  It stopped when I went off the statin and has not reoccurred,  you may be having referred pain... Or not.  I also had flu-like symptoms and malaise.if I were a doc, I'd recommend going off the statin for at least a month to see if symptoms go away.  Some statins take a long time to clear...I actually got worse before I got better when I stopped the statin.  Will NEVER take one again...lost faith in pharma (under reporting side effects) and doc (believes pharma lit). Would also recommend not waiting to see if it gets better....I wasted 3 weeks doing that.   Good luck 

GP's are told to offer statins. They have to prove to their ovrlords that they do. In my opinion, it is criminal to use a potent drug like statins as a preventative medicine, because somebody within the NHS hierarchy had been convinced that by doing so it will save the NHS money in the long run.

The only fact the so called 'clinical trials' have established that statins do lower cholesterol. Everything else, sayhing that they save lives, is only an assumption.

Eventually, once more and more people are waking up to the fact that they are being prescibed a potentially harmful drug, collective actions can be taken to sue the decision makers. In the meantime, all we can do is highlight the con.

Hi Jen. This forum and all the threads on statins will give you mountains of info on statins by people who have suffered them. Like others answering you, I'm wondering if the "level of 4.6" refers to your cholesterol count. If so the doctor has no cause prescribing this dangerous drug to you.

I endured two years of artorvastatin @ 80mg much to the detriment of my health and the criminality of my disinterested doctor. Effects included memory loss, hair loss, obesity, despondency and depression, danger of type 2 diabetes, liver inflamation, excema, aching wrists and ankles and other ailments all growing by the week. Gave up the statins a year ago - still have bouts of after effects but diminishing.

I too had back pains and found myself susceptible to sciatica pain . I couldn't waddle across the road without pain - bearing in mind that for the previous 50 years I had none of these ailments, was fit walking absolutely everywhere and had owned a 28 inch waist all my life.

Statins are poisonous. If your doctor is insisting you take them and/or ridiculing you for not taking them, using scare tactics etc (this is common behaviour from what I've researched) then get another doctor.

As Marco has reported when answering you, there can be permanent and debilitating results in taking this drug - and there is no eveidence that it prevents any heart disease.

Good luck.