Taking Statins to Prevent Heart Attacks

[DogNo1]

Low-dose stains help to prevent heart attacks, but not for the reasons that many doctors think. Here is an excerpt from spacedoc.com:

by Duane Graveline, M.D., M.P.H

An increasing number of physicians are now considering low dose statin therapy. The usual reason for this growing trend in the prescription of statins is statin intolerance due to side effects.

Side effects with statins are very much dose dependent (the higher the dose the greater the chance for side effects). It appears that much of their benefit can be achieved at far lower doses than those generally prescribed.

Statin benefit in atherosclerosis is increasingly believed to result from the anti-inflammatory and immunomodulatory properties of statins, not cholesterol lowering.

Once cholesterol is no longer considered the enemy, then these drugs can be dosed at levels far less than is routine today. I still believe that high risk people can achieve some benefit from statins, but cholesterol levels should not be the marker.

For a long time we have wondered why it is that the benefits of statins frequently occurred even though cholesterol values remained unchanged, even when using the highest recommended doses of these drugs. Additionally it is now common knowledge that over 50 % of myocardial infarctions (heart attacks) occur in people having normal to low cholesterol levels.

[Sheryl]

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