60
10-14 % body fat
blood pressure 120-130
70-80 taken daily
Regular 'triathlon" exercise
Eat well : take fish oil, flax seeds, chia seeds
cholesterol: 201 hdl: 25 ldl 157
Heart problems in family.
Dr. wants to put me on statins (lipitor)
I know there are new studies about this. I will get a second opinion. BUT whatn do you think ? Any advice ?
Just say NO
I assume its because of your ratio. My total is always 210 with a very good ratio. Im 63 and twenty years ago the doc suggested Lipitor. I said I didn’t want it and he never brought it up again.
60
10-14 % body fat
blood pressure 120-130
70-80 taken daily
Regular 'triathlon" exercise
Eat well : take fish oil, flax seeds, chia seeds
cholesterol: 201 hdl: 25 ldl 157
Heart problems in family.
Dr. wants to put me on statins (lipitor)
I know there are new studies about this. I will get a second opinion. BUT whatn do you think ? Any advice ?
Sounds pretty reasonable … interesting why you weren’t on them already with FH and LDL 157 … also low HDL assuming both are accurate. Remember Jim Fixx … exercise doesn’t protect you from coronary disease alone.
Dave
IF you and your doctor decide some kind of cholesterol lowering drug is necessary, take a look at Red Yeast Rice. It is the same molecule as the active compound in statin drugs, but as it is from a natural source all of the molecules are the correct chirality, which a synthetic molecule will not have.
Cholesterol and its role in heart disease is very contentious…
I’d do everything possible with diet and exercise before starting statins.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23583255
Statins impair training adaptations.
http://www.fda.gov/forconsumers/consumerupdates/ucm293330.htm
lists currently known side effects and risks.
Long interesting read on side-effects,
http://www.theguardian.com/science/blog/2014/mar/14/statins-side-effects-study-placebo-ben-goldacre
I think your doctor is on the pay roll of big Pharm. Tim
my situation only: am almost 60 (July). some heart disease in the family. don’t know my body fat % but its higher than i would like 
5’8", 142 lbs in the summer, 148 lbs in the winter. i do a fair bit of swim/bike/run/x-c ski.
my family doctor checks my cholesterol levels regularly. if she feels they they are high, she mentions Statins but does not push them. i stop eating cheese for a month, get another cholesterol blood test and the levels have always come back down to ‘normal’. This has happened a few times in the last 15 or so years.
I don’t eat much cheese normally, so that probably a red herring. i think its just that my cholesterol levels vary from time to time and occasionally look high.
60
10-14 % body fat
blood pressure 120-130
70-80 taken daily
Regular 'triathlon" exercise
Eat well : take fish oil, flax seeds, chia seeds
cholesterol: 201 hdl: 25 ldl 157
Heart problems in family.
Dr. wants to put me on statins (lipitor)
I know there are new studies about this. I will get a second opinion. BUT whatn do you think ? Any advice ?
I’d hate to introduce science into an ST thread … but if you plug your metrics into the AHA/ACC cardiac risk estimator on the new guidelines … your cardiac risk is 13.8% for the next 10 years and 5.7% with risk optimization … risk optimization being what your doctor suggested (statin).
Dave
60
10-14 % body fat
blood pressure 120-130
70-80 taken daily
Regular 'triathlon" exercise
Eat well : take fish oil, flax seeds, chia seeds
cholesterol: 201 hdl: 25 ldl 157
Heart problems in family.
Dr. wants to put me on statins (lipitor)
I know there are new studies about this. I will get a second opinion. BUT whatn do you think ? Any advice ?
I’d hate to introduce science into an ST thread … but if you plug your metrics into the AHA/ACC cardiac risk estimator on the new guidelines … your cardiac risk is 13.8% for the next 10 years and 5.7% with risk optimization … risk optimization being what your doctor suggested (statin).
Dave
agree with Dave but since the bigger risk here is the low hdl I would try fish oil first - at HIGH dose - which means liquid - 20 grams daily (go by the fat grams) for 6 weeks then drop to 5-10 grams daily
brands I trust:
Barleans
Carlsons
Nordic Naturals
Integrative Therapeutics
Enzymatic Therapies
As a physician, I am on a statin (familial hypercholesterolemia). Lipitor is off of patent so not much financial incentive for prescriptions. With your numbers, I would be on a statin. start on a low dose, monitor for rhabdo and AST/ALT. Is there risks with statins, yes there are but that’s why you monitor at initiation of therapyl. You probably take a higher risk of getting on your bike and riding on the roads than you do of having an adverse response to a statin. I also take Co enzyme Q since I’m on a statin (I know it is debatable if this helps with rhabdo risk but why not?)
My cholesterol bounces around quite a bit, but when it cracks 200 i just force myself to eat oatmeal every day and take a 500mg of niacin once a day in a timed release form. Of course you never know what triggers it lower, but every single time mine goes back down to normal or even a 150 level. Usually i do this diet change for about 5 or 6 weeks and recheck. Doc says he thinks it could be the large dose of niacin doing the trick, so i now take 250 every day regardless. Seems like that amount cannot hurt, and perhaps it even helps my immune system as a positive side affect.
Do regular echo’s too, they will tell you if you are filling up your pipes with sludge. If they are clear, i would opt for the non drug options.
Just say no. Too many risks And not enough gains.
So you can either take the advice of your medically trained and qualified doctor and gasman who is a doctor and go on statins or you can take the advice of a bunch of athletes with no qualifications or experience in treating heart disease and not take statins.
Seems an easy decision to me.
Monty,
Mine bounces just like yours. What’s your HDL? With my HDL level,and other stuff like particle count (??), etc, my doctor says might 200 is just fine.
Here are some facts: most US men have some degree of atherosclerosis which is typically unappreciated unless one becomes symptomatic -not good since the first sign of heart disease is often death -like mine- got cpr for almost 15 minutes after my heart stopped during a USTA tennis match -lucky for me, one of the other team players was a cardiologist who did world class cpr (assisted by a peds intensivist who just happened to have finished a match) until the fire rescue squad arrived to defib me and restart my ticker. One can have a lot of narrowing of the coronary arteries without noticeable symptoms- as pointed out above- even endurance athletes. Collateral circulation can develop to help oxygenate the heart -within limits. My cholesterol was never alarmingly high relative to the “normal” range. I had been on a so-called paleo diet for a decade before the event -of course, I grew up on the SAD. I was totally sold on all of the reasons why statins were unnecessary and over-prescribed. I now take one as a belt and suspenders approach to preserving my bypass grafts and reversing other blockage. My diet along with a relatively low dose of statin results in total cholesterol readings between 100 and 125. My hdl is usually about 50. The research indicates that statins have a so-called pleiotropic benefit exclusive of lowering cholesterol: see e.g. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15822172 , , , improved endothelial function, plaque stability, and decrease in oxidative stress and inflammation. I take co q10 to mitigate the suppression that the stain may cause. I don’t notice any side effects. So, yes, it’s a tough call, but if one is not eating a diet like those in parts of the world where heart disease is nearly unknown, statins cannot be easily dismissed.
Mine bounces just like yours. What’s your HDL? With my HDL level,and other stuff like particle count (??), etc, my doctor says might 200 is just fine.
Tell me more about niacin. //
My ratios are always pretty good, the last one 2.86, but usually in the low 3’s, so no issues there. My doc who used to be a big time pro athlete natural guy told me that as far as he knew, niacin was the only over the counter vitamin that he believed lowered cholesterol. So i tried the 500mg once a day when my overall cracked 210 one test, and by the next one it was 160+. Only other thing i did was the oatmeal, which i never ate at the time. I’m guessing if oatmeal does help, it is slower and more gradual, so i have to attribute it to the niacin if it indeed was something other than some normal cycle my body goes through. Really hard to know unless you are taking blood every day and have a real graph to look at. But i have done this 3 different times with the results always being positive, and now with the 250mg daily dose all the time, my last check was 143 with that 2.86 ratio.
Another vote for listening to your doctor.
FWIW: I’m 60. I had a congenital bicuspid aortic valve and got it replaced with a St. Jude mechanical aortic valve 14 years ago. Been on Coumadin (Warfarin) since then, but no other meds. My triglycerides were high, but my doc has had me try to control them by cleaning up my diet and losing weight rather than meds. So far, so good. Biggest thing was losing 25 pounds and keeping it off.
Before my heart surgery my RHR was around 72, my BP was pre-hypertensive and I had left ventricular hypertrophy. With in three years post-op, my RHR is 41, BP is 118/72 and the enlargement has reversed itself to within normal range.
I feel very fortunate that I have both a PCP and a cardiologist that I trust implicitly.
Mark
I did a google search and found this.
Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has ruled that it is illegal to sell red yeast rice that contains more than trace amounts of the cholesterol-lowering substances and to promote red yeast rice for lowering cholesterol levels.
http://www.medicinenet.com/red_yeast_rice_and_cholesterol/article.htm#what_is_red_yeast_rice.
It appears as if the FDA makes it mandatory to remove natural statin from red yeast rice to protect the population from overdosing on it.
The Drug Industry has outdone itself!!!
For whatever this info may be worth:
59 on 1.27.14.
6’2", 175 (same as at age 19).
Resting HR 37 (same as at age 19).
BP 110/70.
Train a solid 20 hr/wk, 52 wk/yr, 75% swim/25% run.
Total Chl 160, HDL 80.
No health issues whatsoever.
Take no drugs of any type.
Eat a normal American diet.
Only times ever hospitalized were due to bike wrecks.
Please note that you are posting this question on a forum full of people that have a history of giving advice of “Ignore your doctor, don’t take the drugs” yet when someone dies competing or training the standard response is “It must have been an undiagnosed condition–that person should have seen a doctor.” Your doctor has given you a warning. This is why you went to see him. Your HDL is not good, should be above 40. Your ratios are not good.
By all means, change your diet. Radical changes (like going vegan/vegetarian) can work wonders. But if you go back to your doctor in 2 months and nothing has changed, be mentally prepared to take the pill.
I say all of this not as a doctor but a fellow triathlete who had a heart attack 2.5 years ago at age 38. I wasn’t overweight and had good (better than yours) cholesterol levels and ratio. I’m still on Lipitor, but at a lower dose than would be normally recommended considering my history, most likely due to exercise and vegetarian diet. I have had ZERO side effects of the medication–there are plenty of people that don’t have side effects, but we don’t tend to post the zero side effect stories on the forums too much…