ATORVASTATIN CAUSING TYPE 2 DIABETES?

Hi Wayne....I didn't know that statins caused excema....but that explains a few things....I have a dry patch on my foot...which the dr. says is excema....he gave me cream  which didn't help...I have also noticed small patches on my arm........my hair was getting thin...was diagnozed type 2.....I have been off statins for a few years....but the dry patches remain...and it took a long time for my hair to get back to ALMOST NORMAL....I honestly don't think you ever get back to normal after taking statins.....we have cholesterol for a reason...our body needs it....but someone at some time decided that we had too much....and to lower it at all costs....

Hi Lisa - the doctor told me that excema was not a side effect of statins, but ignored the fact that i had never suffered the condition in the previous 50 years. I couldn't figure it out and changed my shampoo, soap, bedding - even the bed(!) but, no the condition persisted and worsened, affecting my limbs and my face. It is slowly diminishing - I stopped taking statins about 4 months ago - with red patches on my face coming and going.

Like with you, the doctor prescribed cortisol cream, which didn't really work and that, I believe, is because the damage is at a cellular level and traces of statins must be thoroughly purged from our shell-shocked systems. I was on the poison for two years with a gradual deterioration, and i am hoping that I caught it in time to have avoided any long term damage. Medicines are supposed to heal, not create a a chain of debilitating problems. I am of the opinion that statins are a convenient way of pharma companies and doctors setting us up for a lifetime of ailments. So much for the hippocratic oath of "do no harm." I have no faith in them at all.

I too developed ezcema and I hadn't even connected it to statin use.  I've always had totally clear skin, with no allergies or intolerances whatsoever and suddenly patches of ezcema appeared all over my body, legs, arms, tummy and on the scalp under the hair (that was oddly the most distressing of all).  Thankfully it's mostly gone, just a small patch on one leg appears sometimes but goes quickly if I use E45 or aqueous cream.  I refused cortisol, having read how badly it damages the skin layers.  The dermatologist at my GP surgery said she had 'no idea' why I'd developed it, particularly as I had no allergic reaction to any tested substance.  Now I've read your post, I truly believe it was as a result of taking statins - they caused so many issues to my health it's easy to understand how badly they disrupt the normal functioning of the body.  My doctors group practice all still bluntly refuse that statins cause anything but the mildest of 'side effects' pah!

Loxie my gp said this was a patch of eczema that first appeared on my foot...but it was not itchy...never has been....the cream he gave me did no good...then a red dry patch appeared on my cheek.....nothing helps to clear it.. if I use a cream...it takes the dryness away but leaves it red....In all my life I never was bothered with anything like this....I took statins for over ten years ..and stopped them about 5 years ago....I even had a punch biopsy to rule out skin cancer...I wondered for some time if it could be statins side effects...but it wasn't till I read Wayne's post that I was convinced....too many side effects happening to too many people...

Me too Lisa.  I hadn't made any connection with my skin issues and statins until I read this thread.  But it makes sense now.  I get really frustrated and distressed by all the seemingly unconnected odd complaints and symptoms that followed my statin use and which were all dismissed by my GP's as 'nothing to worry about' but undiagnosable.  I'm also heartily sick of being told that everything I present with is 'age related' - I'm only 60 and until statins were prescribed my health was relatively good, my diet was good, my weight was height appropriate, my blood pressure normal, my blood sugar normal and I had no aches, pains, allergies, etc etc.  It's rather more than a coincidence that my general health deteriorated so rapidly at the same time as taking statins, and whilst some symptoms improved when I stopped them, others have persisted and thus it's not surprising I now believe my health has been permanently damaged by these toxins - not a belief shared by my doctors, who persistently and continuously insist its 'my age' and unrelated to statin use.  I was emotionally blackmailed into taking them by being told by my GP that despite my general good health, because I had familial high cholesterol, I was a stroke waiting to happen. What utter rubbish I now know that to be!

after taking them for a number of years I had pains in my arms...so much so that i could hardly hold a newspaper...the gp I saw then..told me to stop them for a couple of weeks...the pain went away...he told me not to take anymore...that it was the statins causing the pain....next lot of blood tests showed my cholesterol had gone back up.....different gp this time....put me back on the statins....at a low dose after I told him about the other gp stopping them...after that I was diagnozed type 2 ....I couldn't walk upstairs...the weakness and pain in my legs was terrible...

but according to the blood results...THERE WAS NOTHING WRONG ...so I stopped taking them altogether.....soon felt a lot better.....

but some of the effects persist....I wish I had never heard of them...

To both Lisa and Loxie - Ladies, reading your posts is like reliving exactly what happened to me. Like both of you I'd had no problems, was considered very healthy, and then the doctor got his hands on me. After more than 4 months now free of statins I can't believe how sick they were making me. I still have bouts of dilemmas - muscle aches and wanting to stretch them out of my skin especially at night, burning in the liver, and patches of excema that fade then erupt, though all these things are very slowly diminishing. I had been using cortisol, but thanks to you Loxie, I will try the aqueous cream.

I think we are lucky to have questioned the doctors orders and taken charge of our situation. Raised cholesterol or not, life is better drug free.

I couldn't agree more....my husband took them too ...not as long as I did ...then he stopped them...his memory is terrible....can't walk any distance.....it make me so angry when some gp's and nurses tell you the benefits outweigh the side effects....