Refusing to take statins. What can my doctor do?
Posted , 24 users are following.
Hi,
Having read a lot about statins, the very high numbers needed to treat and the harm they can do, I told my doctor I did not wish to take them. We almost ended up by arguing as she dismissed my concerns and insisted that her advice is that I should take them. Mu current level is 7.3.
I showed her research which showed the numbers needed to treat (NNT) for statin use in those who have not been diagnosed as having heart disease is between 50 and 250; I showed her a pro-statin study which said if 1000 patients were statinised for 5 years, just 18 events of cardiac disease would be avoided. The study hailed that as a success!
Still she repeated her advice. I asked if I still refused would she have me exception reported as a non-complier and she shrugged which I took to mean 'yes'.
My previous doctor, now retired, understood my reluctance to take statins and the reasons for it and didn't push them onto me. It seems that the new doctor is now bullying me into taking her advice to take statins.
Blood tests have all shown my liver to be functioning as it should and yet the new doctor told that if I take the statins I must have another test to ensure they are not damaging my liver, a known possible side effect!
Given the huge controversy around statin use, can anyone tell me where I stand if I still refuse to take the doctors advice? Can she kick me off her list at a surgery where I have been a patient for 70 years?
4 likes, 53 replies
pamela29600 Tafia43
Posted
Tafia43,
don't be bullied into taking anything you're not happy with. They try to force Statins onto everyone now. Any excuse is given. Yes your cholesterol is high but you can lower that yourself with diet and exercis. My husband was told he was level 7.2 in August. He said he would bring it down himself so I altere4d our diet and he did some small jogs around the block after dark. I was then told that MY level was 8. I was shocked. I was given a prescription for Statins and was told that it would be virtually im possible to bring the level right down myself.
I read lots of info for the following few weeks about Statins, and like you, was not at all happy about the side effdects etc so I didn't take them.
My husband went back for a further test after 3 months and his level was down to 4.1, the lowest it has ever been since he's been getting tested. I am still following the diet and have been power walking between 1 and 3 miles almost every day. I haven't been back for a test yet, as 3 months are not up, but I have lost a stone in weight. So there has surely got to be some improvement there!
Good luck.
josef23601 Tafia43
Posted
Dear Tafia, I know the feeling, I am 57 and my cholesterol level is 7, but I don't drink or smoke, I don't see how handing out statins willy-nilly, without looking into other lifestyle factors makes any sense. My mother is a very healthy sprightly women in her mid-seventies, she was advised to take them, but they did not agree with her at all.
The Doctor in the hospital advised her to go to a health food shop and buy some Red Rice Yeast capsules, they are perfectly natural and contain no chemicals. It worked! I have ordered some off of Amazon after reading customer reviews, and the results seem very encouraging from them, lots of customers claiming that their Cholesterol has been lowered after taking this product.
Myself, who is always on the cautious healthy side of cynicism, have ordered some as well. I am going to take them for 6 weeks before I go for a blood test, my tests have consistently shown between one and one and a half points over the safe level, so in a few weeks I shall find out the truth. I figured for about five pounds a month it is worth a try.
Just my tuppence worth
EileenH josef23601
Posted
"Red Rice Yeast" - of course cholesterol goes down, it is chemically exactly the same substance as in lovastatin. The difference? Lovastatin is a measured amount and manufactured under tightly controlled conditions, like all pharmaceuticals. Red rice yeast counts as a "food supplement" so you have no guarantees about the contents. And since it is the same stuff - it still has the same potential to cause side effects. In fact anything that has a chemical effect has the potential to lead to side effects.