Statins and Brain Health - I’m Going There

Statins worry me. I see so many assisted living residents come to our homes taking them. I will often question their doctor about the need for the resident to be taking them.

Especially if their cholesterol level is low.

I’ve seen sometimes that the doctor doesn’t even know the resident’s cholesterol level. They’re just on the statin because the resident is ‘at the age where statins are appropriate’. Now I’m not trying to give you medical advice. These emails are just for information purposes only. If you have a good doctor that you trust, by all means listen to them.

Ultimately though, medical decisions should be yours. And you should base those decisions on information from a wide range of sources.

As I look into statins, I find lots of problems. Side effects that can be serious, without much benefit.

Especially cognitive side effects.

Like this study.

“This pilot study found an improvement in cognition with discontinuation of statins and worsening with rechallenge. Statins may adversely affect cognition in patients with dementia.”

Or another study of 171 patients.

“128 patients (75%) experienced cognitive ADRs (Adverse Drug Reactions) determined to be probably or definitely related to statin therapy. Of 143 patients (84%) who reported stopping statin therapy, 128 (90%) reported improvement in cognitive problems, sometimes within days of statin discontinuation (median time to first-noted recovery 2.5 wks). Of interest, in some patients, a diagnosis of dementia or Alzheimer's disease reportedly was reversed.”

The study took the patients off statins and saw cognitive abilities IMPROVE. Some had their cognitive decline completely reversed!

There’s a lot of evidence that heart disease is not so much a result of cholesterol, which statins reduce. Instead, like many other chronic diseases, there seems to be a big link between insulin resistance (diabetes anyone) and cardiovascular problems.

Yet if you look at the ‘Number Needed to Treat’ (NNT) for heart disease vs your chance of contracting diabetes on statins, the numbers are quite telling. NNT is the number of people who have to take the drug to achieve one desired outcome.

Yes you read that right. Statins may help you contract diabetes. That same link from the NNT website also had this gem:

You would think if statins caused cognitive problems, or they put you at risk of diabetes, there would be a real advantage in protecting you from dying of a heart attack. Yet the NNT website says it really doesn’t give you any benefit.

Another study from the British Medical Journal tends to make me believe there really isn’t much benefit from taking statins.

“6 studies for primary prevention and 5 for secondary prevention with a follow-up between 2.0 and 6.1 years were identified. Death was postponed between −5 and 19 days in primary prevention trials and between −10 and 27 days in secondary prevention trials. The median postponement of death for primary and secondary prevention trials were 3.2 and 4.1 days, respectively.”

I’m all about fighting to live your life to the fullest and live as long as you possibly can. I’m just not sure those extra 3-4 days of life are worth cognitive decline and diabetes.

A lot of the information for this email came from this video by Ivor Cummins.