Cholesterol Medication and muscle damage

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Does anyone else out there use cholesterol meds? I just started taking Crestor, think i should reconsider?


Cholesterol medication can result in muscle weakness - Healtheries

Cholesterol medication can result in muscle weakness
BY JULIE SEAMER
THURSDAY, MARCH 20, 2008


Statins, a popular set of medication used to lower cholesterol can result in muscle weakness, pain, debilitating and even life-threatening muscle damage, studies have found.

The Journal of Clinical Investigation offers the first evidence that a gene known as atrogin-1 plays a key role in statin-related muscle toxicity. Statins such as Lipitor, Zocor, Pavacol and Mevacor lower cholesterol but they may also activate this gene. Three separate tests showed that at even low concentrations, statin drugs led to atrogin-1 induced muscle damage. As the concentration was increased, the damage increased as well.

This news may be somewhat alarming for those seeking to increase muscle mass, but are also taking cholesterol medication. There is no argument that these drugs do work very well at lowering high cholesterol levels. However there are other, far-reaching ways to treat the cause of the problem, particularly nutritionally.

Tips to keep cholesterol low, naturally:
normalise insulin levels by eliminating sugars and grains

take a high quality fish oil that is high in omega 3 fatty acids, such as Healtheries Omega Advanced Omega 3

Check your iron levels as elevated iron within the body can cause oxidative damage in blood vessels, heart and other organs

Exercise regularly

In men, muscle weakness can also be a symptom of male menopause, otherwise known as andropause. 40% of men in their 40s, 50s and 60s experience loss of muscle mass, increased lethargy, irritability, mood swings and difficulty attaining or sustaining an erection, that are caused by andropause.

If you experience symptoms of muscle weakness, such as flaccidity, loss of strength and are taking statin medication, or are male between 40-60yrs, there could be an explanation, beyond general ageing/physiology.

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i have seen a ton of bad shit about statins. fuck that.

have you tried cutting most of your saturated fat intake? saturated fat is a major factor in high cholesterol, much more so then dietary cholesterol.

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i have seen a ton of bad shit about statins. fuck that.

have you tried cutting most of your saturated fat intake? saturated fat is a major factor in high cholesterol, much more so then dietary cholesterol.

Ya saturated fat is the worst. Cholesterol only seems to go up after a big bulker, i think high test also contributes. Not sure how acurate some of these studies are. I know of a few people (not bodybuilders) on satins for years without any negatives sides. Not sure which way to go yet..

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cardio 5 times a week, very clean diet (no junk food). thats the way i would go. do that for 2-3 months and get tested again.

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How you supposed to bulk with just clean food, you need the calories, that usually comes with fat. And what about test. You want me to give that up too.

[Bouncer]

How you supposed to bulk with just clean food, you need the calories, that usually comes with fat. And what about test. You want me to give that up too.

you might have to give up the idea of bulking for now. your health is far more important then a goal of bulking.

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CRESTOR SIDE EFFECTS MAKE MORE HEADLINES -- BUT UNDERLYING CAUSES AND PREVENTIVE MEASURES ARE AGAIN IGNORED. A New Study Shows Higher Rates of Adverse Reactions with Crestor Than with Other Statins. Here's the Real Story on Super-Strong Crestor and What to Do About It.

According to a new study, serious side effects with the cholesterol-lowering drug Crestor (rosuvastatin) have been reported to the FDA at a much higher rate than with other statin drugs such as Lipitor or Zocor.1 Deaths on Crestor have also been reported at a higher rate. These findings made headlines, but problems with Crestor are no surprise. As I told the FDA in 2002 and have stated and written many times since, problems with Crestor were predictable from the day Crestor was approved.

Super-Strong Crestor Overmedicates Patients and Causes Side Effects
AstraZeneca designed Crestor to be the strongest statin. This would be fine if Crestor, the newest and least known statin, was reserved for use only when other statins were ineffective. However, rosuvastatin was not marketed this way. AstraZeneca launched an expensive, intensive marketing campaign -- which was highly criticized in some medical journals -- to convince doctors to prescribe super-strong Crestor as the first choice for people with elevated cholesterol. The problem is, the lowest dosages of Crestor (5 and 10 mg) are still very strong. They are much stronger than millions of patients need to achieve proper cholesterol levels. The authors of the new study concluded that there were "concerns about the safety of this drug at the range of doses used in common clinical practice .1" This is the key point. An accompanying editorial stated that "the doses of statins [should] not exceed those required to achieve current goals of therapy.2" Yet, Crestor is so strong, even its lowest doses exceed those required by many patients to reach their cholesterol goals. Excessive dosages cause more side effects.

Most people with elevated cholesterol require reductions in their LDL levels of 25% to 30%. This can usually be accomplished quite nicely with 20 or 40 mg of Mevacor (or its much less expensive generic, lovastatin), or 40 mg of Lescol, or 20 or 40 mg of Pravachol.3,4 These are the milder statins, and they are less likely to cause side effects. With the strong statin Lipitor, you need only 2.5 or 5 mg, but you will get 10 mg -- 100% to 400% excess medication -- because 10 mg is the lowest dosage Pfizer makes. With strong Zocor, you need only 5 or 10 mg, but doctors routinely prescribe Merck's recommended initial dosage of 20 or 40 mg -- again much more medication that actually needed.4 With super-strong Crestor, the proper dose for reducing LDL 25%-30% is 1 mg, yet the lowest doses available are 5 mg or 10 mg -- five to ten times more medication than these people need.4-6 Such overmedication causes more frequent and more serious side effects. This is why the FDA is receiving more reports about Crestor than any other statin drug, and why 62% of the reports about Crestor involved the 5 mg and 10 mg dosages.1

To avoid side effects with statin medications, it is vital to use the correct dosage. If you get 10 mg of Crestor when you only need 1 mg, your risks go way up. For example, with each doubling of a statin dosage, the risk of liver injury also doubles.7 Excessive dosages also dramatically increase the risks of other side effects such as muscle pain, kidney injury, memory problems, fatigue, or abdominal discomfort.

Another way to look at it: 10 mg of Crestor, which is the initial dose that doctors usually prescribe, is far stronger than the maximum dose of Mevacor, which is 80 mg. The usual initial dose of Mevacor is only 20 mg. In other words, the usual initial dose of Crestor (10 mg ) is about six times more powerful than the usual initial dose of Mevacor (20 mg). This extra potency comes with extra risks of side effects.