It was the craziest thing, my elbows felt like they needed to pop but couldn't.  I was taking 20mgs of Zocor, and the first couple of months the elbows were fine, but one day I realized they hurt and wouldn't pop.  I enjoy tennis and will occasionally shoot baskets with the boys - working elbows are a requirement for both sports.  I told my doctor the problem and he said to stop taking Zocor, and after two weeks he will have me try a different statin.  Avoiding Zocor brought relief.  After a week of being statin free the elbows stopped aching.    

I havn't gone back to my doctor to receive a prescription for that new statin.  After learning more about heart disease prevention from this sight and others, my starting LDL was low to begin with right around 80, and so decided to take a different natural approach to lower my LDL and more importantly for me raise HDL.  I cleaned up my diet and began taking nutritional supplements.  It worked, today cholesterol levels are great, and I have working elbows.

When I first started on Lipitor 20mgs a few months back I suffered from 'Lipitor Leg'; that dull, annoying pain that plays hide-and-seek in and about the calf and thigh muscle.  And of course, only one leg, too.  Weird, nu? But it went away when I doubled my intake of CoEnzyme Q10 from 150mgs to 300mgs daily. (yeah, I don't like taking chances on being stingy)
I could easily blame the Lipitor I'm taking for my short-term memory issues, but I'm hesitant to pass absolute judgment as of yet, only because of the tremendous amount of reading/researching I do daily combined with the fact that I sometimes have my head up my ass, and it causes me to forget stuff.  I'll keep you posted.
And you keep posting this fantastic stuff, too!
Adam

I have experienced the muscle aches, absent mindedness and what I believe to be severe GERD. The GERD symptoms where so severe that I stopped taking Lipitor (20 MG) a month ago.

Dr Davis - have you tried Q.O.D. administration of longer acting statin? There is a cardiologist in Hartford CT (PD Thompson) who  
has found that Q.O.D.  administration of statins "significantly improves serum lipid levels" (PUB MED ID 16230873)

Peace,

Joe E O

Hi, Joe-

No, I didn't know that!

Sounds like an interesting strategy. I think it's worth a try.

After taking Lipitor 10mg for a few days I developed an occasional pain in the back of my right eye.  Since I had never had a pain like that before I stopped taking it and the pain disappeared a few days later, never to return.  Although my cardiologist said he had never heard of anything like that, I found several people on the internet who reported having varying types of vision-related reactions.  It's fairly obvious that some people do have strange reactions.  Years ago, when it was a prescription drug, I once took Claritin and thought I was going to die when my airway started to close down.  Now (don't laugh) I'll only take a new drug in the parking lot of the hospital!  Thinking you won't be able to breathe might do that for you.  Fortunately I don't really have to take any drugs   ...   yet.
        TYP member:  the164club

Add another wacky side-effect to the list!

Wacky? Well, I'm not sure how memory loss, muscle and bone pain, and debilitating diarrhea can be considered "wacky", but yea, I had them and more...how about severe depression? For the first time in my life I would cry at the least thing and had to force myself out of bed and do anything!!

I'm sorry. Wacky? That isn't a term I'd use for the side effects that I and many others experienced.

For those of us that have had severe reactions to these drugs it is very difficult to get your doc to understand and believe. My doc actually laughed at me!! Many are ignored when they complain about muscle and bone pain....then when it gets unbearable they sometimes will quit the drug. Others have what appears to be permanent peripheral neuropathy as a result of statins and their effect being ignored. Having a physician, and an apparently fairly well known one, call these side effects "wacky" minimizes what many have gone thru and makes it harder for others to convince their docs!

Two weeks after I started 10mg/day of Lipitor I developed tinnitus.  I had never noticed a ringing in my ears before and now all of a sudden it was LOUD.  After three months I saw my doctor for a cholesterol retest (it went way down) and complained of the tinnitus.  He said he hadn't heard of this side effect, but I told him the web said 2% complain of it.  He suggested I go to 5mg/day to see if it helped.  I tried this for a few months, then went totally off for a few weeks, and the tinnitus got better, but never went away.  I'm still on a 5mg dose after 9 months and I still have tinnitus.  My fear is that the damage is done and the tinnitus will never go away.

Other bloggers: you might have something about the tinnitus. I had been plagued by tinnitus a few years ago - unrelated to statins - eventually it went away. I suspect medications. However, six days ago I began 5 mg simvastatin and the tinnitus came back, same sort of noise, same annoying level or volume. Dr. Davis mentioned tinnitus and Zocor in his "wacky" side effects posting. Maybe not so wacky, huh?

I got sun sensitivity from taking Simvastatin.  Wherever my skin is exposed to the sun, it turns red and starts itching intensely and my skin looks like giant hives.  I have to wear long sleeves, gloves, turtlenecks, etc.  

Has anyone else ever had this side effect?

Veedubmom

I was on Lipitor, but as a result of teh recent study, asked to go on Simvastatin. I too have never suffered tinnitus until taking statins. I perceive it most at night. It sounds either like e pure high pitched white noise, or often like being stuck in an aviary with a million high pitched birds. I did not suffer any pains, but I clearly am more forgetful. I also feel depressed, and really don;t care about anything.. Paying bills, family, cleaning, you name it. Also, my rosacea seems to act up a lot more.

I started Zocor 2 weeks ago and have ringing in right ear. Somtimes irs loud. I also had dizzyness and feeling of confusion the 1st week. Insomnia too.

I don't know why there is no real documentation on these type of statin side effects. I'm guessing that there is too much money behind the labeled products.

To sum up:

I started taking statins a couple of years ago. A friend told me that he heard that they caused altzheimers-like symptoms. I didn't think that I exhibeted any effects like that, so I pretty much ignored it, except to raise the issue with my doctor.

During the last two years, I gradually lost interest in pretty much everything. It wasn't that I was forgetful, I just didn't much care about anything. Didn't care about my hobbies, quit my job, only paid bills when I felt like it, left a rental property vacant for 1 1/2 years and other similar issues.

I am normally a pretty active person with lots of pursuits. When I spoke to my doctor about my 'lack of interest and motivation', she suggested putting me on testosterone and later a mood enhancer. (I'm 60 and I lost my wife to breast cancer about 3 years ago, so I guess the thinking was either that I was going through male menopause or just depressed over her passing.)

Although I never had the muscle aches or liver problems that are considered the side effects of statins, gradually, I began to feel weaker (not uncommon at 60) and more lackadaisical in my approach to bills and  responsibilities. I also began suffering continual intense tinnitus and insomnia. I became crankier and more vehement in my dealings with other people and dangerously aggressive while driving.

Oddly enough, my lack of concern with paying bills led to the pharmacist telling me that Blue Shield had canceled me. Although I could easily have called the doctor for a prescription for $5 statins through KMart, I just couldn't be bothered, so I discontinued my medication.

It's been about 2 1/2 weeks since my prescription ran out. Within 4 days I began feeling better and my thinking became clearer. I no longer have tinnitus, my good mood has returned and I **actually** accept  life's small annoyances again. Finally, I feel better physically and am more motivated. (Unfortunately, now I have to clean up all the financial garbage I've accumulated in the last year or so.)

If you take statins and begin to suffer any of the symptoms that I've noted above. **Tell** your doctor to take you off for a month. If your symptoms improve, you'll know why.

Although I no longer have medical insurance, one requirement of the coverage was that my cholesterol be controllable with statins. I'd rather have a heart attack or stroke and die than to go back to being the useless walking zombie that I was.

John B. Egan
Grass Valley,CA

Just want to add that I've changed my screen name. This post was an update to my prior January 24, 2009 post as jegan.

What can i say. I feel more inventive these days.

jegan aka Urbanegorilla.

My father has been on Lipitor for close to two years now.  He's getting almost daily "light-headed" symptoms (sometimes several times a day) where he explains that he becomes disoriented.  He'll ask me what day of the week it is.  Or completely forget a conversation we would just have.  It all comes back after a few minutes; but still very scary. As one commenter said, I too have been having trouble convincing people of his symptoms.  Doctors downplay it (and they shouldn't.  No matter how small the group experiencing this).  I'm trying to convince him to get off the statins and instead adopt a strict diet (no wheat/sugar etc. and lots of fish oil). He wont listen.  Does anyone know if this side effect can worsen with continued use? Can I have him take something (CoQ10)that may help lessen symptoms?

-concerned son

In response to anonymous who's father is suffering mental issues.. My doctors had no idea that depression, memory problems, unusual spontaneous anger and lack of interest could be caused by statins. My opinion is that pharma is not interested in publishing these matters. Why would they? They make a ton of money selling the products.

If I hadn't forgotten to pay my Blue Cross bill I would never have known the difference as I was truly in a daze. Not only did I forget to pay the bill, but I couldn't develop enough interest to call either Blue Cross, or my doctor for a new prescription so I could go buy statins at KMart for $4.

Tell your dad's doctor to take him off the drugs for 2 weeks..See how he feels after that time. He won't have a heart attack in that period but he may well recover as I did.

Having said that, I still only feel partly improved but considerably so over my fugue state.

In their defense (and in general I am no defender of the drug manufacturers), most people do fine with statin drugs, though the majority do eventually require coenzyme Q10 in my experience. By the way, coenzyme Q10 can be an indispensable aid to help tolerate statin agents.

As we all know, statins reduce the problem of people suffering from high cholesterol level. Some side effects of this drug may be eliminated with the help of coenzymes.

Time to stop bashing primary care docs, doc. Online sites are full of B.S.
Show me the evidence that testing with CAC improves outcomes (Sure it predicts risks, not the same as actually preventing disease, especially in those at lower risk of CAD.)

Hi Jan,
Since you accept plaque showing up as being a cardio-vascular risk factor then if Doc reports he has treated some patients whose measurement of plaque has diminished using his protocol would you also accept the proposition that those patients have reduced one of their cardio-vascular risk factors?
If Doc has patient records showing diminished plaque and therefore one less risk might that not be considered preventative due to his patient following his protocol ?
As for those individuals with hypothetically lower risk of CAD (ex: the 63 year old low cholesterol example Doc gave) are they not going to undergo changes as they age ?  
A primary care physician is valuable and yet older westerners are increasingly engaging specialists for good reasons.  Doc has a self-professed specialty tracking plaque  that he wants to impart; sure, his blogging tone may not always be mellow.

Dear Might,
Your comment is akin to those who report the association of statin use with lowered risk of MI. A correlation does not prove causation until valid  scientific research confirms.
How do we know treating CAC lowers risk of MI until a study proves this? Docs have been wild to accept the association of statin use lowering cholesterol components as the mechanism of effectiveness for prevention of MI, ignoring studies in which dietary measures that did the same were ineffective. Just pointing out the need for caution in going so far as to treat a test without evidence that the intervention is working on the test findings (rather than something else).
Perhaps there are studies that are underway or perhaps the evidence, er association, is just considered too strong, (Bradford-Hill criteria) to ethically justify a trial. My concern is for individuals who score in the lower range of abnormal. At what cost do we label and treat those?

just remembret the lyon heart study, by  Renaud & de Lorgeril demonstrating the efficacy  of mediterranean diet in lowering the risk of recurrent MI in French patients. although cholesterol levels were higher with diet than with statins. Dietary measures seem there to demonstrate  efficacy

Not only is it NOT time to stop bashing primary care docs, but it's time to begin accepting that their role is outdated. In fact, an average nurse practitioner or physician's assistant can do an equal, if not better, job than most primary care physicians. How health care is dispensed is going to undergo dramatic transformation, just as the business of travel agents and real estate have been transformed by rapid information exchange.

In our program, we see virtually NO heart attacks. Not a randomized clinical trial, but watching heart attacks drop from a weekly event to almost never is good enough for me to not accept the status quo and continue to work along a path that, from every indication, works exceptionally well.

If high crab diets are considered unhealthy then why do some cultures like the rural Chinese live long healthy lives on nearly 100% crabs,mostly rice and vegetables?

Isn't the best thing for calcium on wrong places vitamin K2 ?
In my country doctors even prescribe it for calcification issues.
Dose is around 100mcg/day for 6-12 mo.

Read Gary Taubes' "Good Calories, Bad Calories" to find several instances of other cultures eating the typicial high carb food yet seemingly stay within the healthy range.

Trust my care (or a family members care) to a NP or PA who does not have the capability of complex medical decision making - no thanks. NP's actually are complimentary to physicians with different skill sets. So glad to know your level of knowledge about them. PA's are nothing but junior medical students with enormous salaries. Working 9 to 5 - oh, yeah!

I'm certain your referral network of primary care docs would be interested in your belief system.

Dr. Davis:
I don't know if you've seen this new video yet, but I think you'll want to.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vr-c8GeT34&feature=player_embedded
If you do watch it, I have a question. This doctor thinks sugar (by itself) plays a huge role in causing plaque to rupture and cause heart attacks, etc. If after watching the video you agree with him, would you please tell me how (biologically) it does this?
Thanks!

Joe

Hi Jan,
True correlation does not necessarily equate to causation. As for statins, it seems that statins act to lessen inflammatory processes; and it is this dynamic, rather than numerically lowering cholesterol, that is a crucial way that statins correlate with reduced risk. Which, to me,  seems to further support Doc's contention here in this posting that  low cholesterol levels doesn't  tell one if they have abnormal plaque (ex: patient above with "exceedingly high" score) .

I will accept Doc's data, as given ,that very high plaque is a 15-20% risk factor since many other published sources cite even carotid plaque as a risk factor . As far as who to test for what, and when, I am not qualified to make recommendations. I do know that time can remodel some cellular dynamics and the aging cardio-vascular system is vulnerable to alterations.  Doc's got my attention because no one at all in my paternal male ancestral line lived past their late 50's due to heart problems and I am 60; while my 61 year old brother already was hospitalized from transient ischemic attack  .

Mediterranean diet's efficacy for heart health is probably due to the % of poly-amines per calorie consumed and of course isn't in keeping with Doc Davis' detestation of modern wheat (among other protocols). As we age our poly-amine levels decrease and Mediterranean diet supplies lots of poly-amines.

Poly-amines ( molecules inelegantly named spermine, spermadine and putrescine) are all anti-inflammatory, especially spermine; in our body we synthesize poly-amines from arginine. Mediterranean diet's high poly-amine levels spares the amount of arginine our body uses in synthesizing poly-amines; and thus we can more readily produce the vaso-dilator signalling molecule NO (nitric oxide) from body's arginine. NO is valuable to keep oxygenated blood reaching the heart muscle cells; NO keeps vessels from constricting dangerously.

Poly-amines lower inflammation and in the context of age associated problems the less low grade inflammation the better.  Inflammation leads to defectively functioning cells and molecular processes; with time the  over stimulation of immunological responses (both innate and adaptive immunity) leaves the body burdened with unknown clones of T cells (both memory and effector types). Eventually the build up of  T cell clones limits new variants and what occurs is more macrophages circulating; once an over abundant macrophage stage reins the body is essentially always in low grade inflammation , and prone to various age associated pathology (including cardio-vascular).

@jan....
A vast majority of primary care doctors are extremely limited in their abilities to treat/advise patients for CVD risks. They don't understand nutrition, effects of supplements upon serum biomarkers, nor effective diagnostic testing for heart disease.
CAC is a much better biomarker for who is at greater risk of CVD than serum markers:
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-08/jhmi-sfc081611.php

I seriously doubt even 1:100 primary care docs see studies like the aforementioned one.
And I seriously doubt the one doc would understand it....
Dr. John

An interpretation of the same study for a broader audience just appeared at http://www.webmd.com/heart-disease/news/20110818/is-calcium-test-the-best-way-to-check-for-heart-risk.

I'd accept a bashing of physicians in general.   But to single out primary care physicians - overwhelmed with paperwork and patients with multiple problems, and vastly underpaid and underappreciated, and continually put down by "Partialists" - Really ? Cardiologists are superior? Really ?

Forget my support and admiration henceforth.

CRP (C-reactive protein), an inflammation marker surrogate, does not directly correlate with whether there is coronary artery calcium (CAC), or the degree of CAC severity. CRP is also subject to variables of race and age, so it loses some potential as a predictive marker. Yet looking at CAC along with CRP is considered useful for complex insight into a patients pathology.

Analysis of the Multi-Ethnic Study  of Atherosclerosis (MESA) involving 6,800 men & women seems to indicate that inflammatory markers (ex: CRP) relate to the physiology of pathological processes other than CAC laid down; possibly because plaque undergoes morphological changes over time. The CRP level is proposed, by some, to relate more to the stability of plaque from rupturing and the incidence of blood clotting in a thrombosis.

The inflammatory marker of Interleukin-6 (IL-6) anti-bodies seems to be better than CRP and fibrinogen for correlating an individual's trend toward CAC. Thus the cytokine IL-6 is a better indicator of sub-clinical atherosclerosis; Doc likes to cut to the chase, eyeball the plaque and track it with current technology ( that is not available worldwide).

Is it typical for someone with such low ldl and high hdl to have such a high CAC score? Had he previously had a higher LDL and then been placed on a statin?

The energy expenditure of the rural Chinese is very high.  They don't drive, they walk, or ride bicycles.  They don't sit in office from 9am to 5pm, they work hard in the rice field from 5am to 9pm.  They can eat anything without gaining weight.
For the urban Chinese, it is a different story.  They have the same life sytle as ours, and they are getting heavier every year.  More and more people become diabetic, even young kids.

K2 is indeed a fascinating nutrient. There are extensive discussions about it on the Track Your Plaque website.

Thanks, Joe. I watched the entire thing and was impressed with Dr. Diamond's grasp of the issues.

I'm going to post this on the main page because I think his overview was extremely effective.

Sorry you see it that way. This was a comment directed at the system of primary care in general.

I reread the post and I didn't see the name "Dr. Thomas White" mentioned anywhere. If you choose to feel slighted in some way, that's your choice.

Jan, I would certainly trust my care (or a family members care) to a NP or PA who looks outside just the pharma driven medical journals which primarily support a diagnose & drug philosophy.  And I'll take an NP or PA who actually uses some common sence rather than being a puppet given to the pushy drug rep.

I live in a family of MD's, and they have made it clear as to their terribly limited training and knowledge they gain from med school on the level of building and supporting the body from within.  Example, I have an Aunt that is currently suffering from stage 4 cancer. Due to the chemo treatment that she's instructed to not spend time in the Sun. Her Dr. has not even checked her for vitamin D levels. This is not the exception, but the norm when it comes to common sence treatment, pathetic.

Okay, Dr. Davis.  I'll be looking for it. When you do, please take a moment and explain how you think that sugar might be responsible for plaque rupture.
Thanks again!

Joe

Sugar is just one part of the equation.  As Dr. Davis has covered on this website, small LDL is also a villian and needs to be minimized as much as possible.

Hi Joe,
Thanx for the video ... maybe the following answers you.

Regarding sugar: see 59:33 into presentation, where diagram shows "sugar" blurb  - lecturer is using compact word sugar to represent how glucose's glycation end products alter the artery and make the artery vulnerable. It is not a molecule of sugar acting all by itself; lecturer explains slide when talks of how glycation is a problem (another of  Doc Davis'  peeves).

Follow up at 1:01 into presentation: see diagram's top left  where the various adverse influences on artery  are specified as "modified lipoprotein", "hemodynamic insult" (includes, but is not limited to blood sugar's  glycation end products affect on artery), "reactive oxygen species" (ROS) and "infectious agents".

Thank you for all your hard work and dedication to your web site and education.

I apologize for cluttering up the discussion with a personal statement.

TRW

Thank you, Might. I guess I'm going to have to do some research on glycation before I can fully understand what you're saying above.

I didn't even notice the PowerPoint Presentation that was included with Dr. Diamond's video presentation.  Sigh.

Thanks again!

Joe

AMEN! Right on target.

I don't know if you're aware of the differences between calculated test that most doctors use and NMR that Dr. Davis uses. When your diet consists of mostly carbohydrates leading to chronic high blood sugar level, it tends to raise your SMALL DENSE LDL level but calculated cannot measure it accurately. It often greatly underestimate it.  Dr. Davis has covered it many times. Dig through his website for it.

Optimal vitamin D level helps lower IL-6. It can be a big problem with black people as they tend to have the lowest vitamin D level of any races. Dr. Cannell mentioned that in his new book called Athlete's Edge Faster Quicker Stronger with vitamin D with the hope that the word about vitamin D would spread out faster if more and more professional athletes started using it to gain some advantage over opponents much like what East Germany and formerly USSR used to do in 1960 and 1970s at the Olympic games and other world events.

Yes Joe i have seen the video you linked. That's right i also think the same.

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