High cholesterol/high blood pressure

The trouble is, foxie, each time someone decides not to take advice they still need that advice to work out if they want to follow it.

The idea that people who often don't take advice shouldn't seek it in the first place is just silly.

We all like to know what a doctor/consultant thinks so that we are able to make a decision!

What I don't understand is this continual claim that doctors get paid for prescribing statins and blood pressure tablets. They most certainly don't in the UK, they get paid for doing health checks and if someone chooses not to take their GP's advice fgs stop having the health checks and stop wasting your GP's time. My daughter is a doctor and the suggestion that she is motivated by anything other than wanting the best outcome for her patients is, frankly, just so insulting!

I thought things had moved onto a grown-up debate/logical thinking now.

Obviously not...clearly some still getting a kick out of putting down other people....

You make me laugh Cariad

Logically option 2 could cost the NHS a fortune. If you collapse in the street with your major heart attack or stroke you will be rushed to hospital and treated. There won't be time for you to say, 'Actually, leave me alone.' You might wake up in ICU unable to speak or voice your preferences. Services are busy and under pressure. They'll actually first.

Whilst facts are being quoted - one way or another - to prove or disprove a verdict = it would be useful to have the facts of the basic two approaches to the news one has started down the heart failure route:

1. THE CONVENTIONAL APPROACH
Do what you're told by the medics - and have the various tests and then charge the NHS for packet after packet of statins and any other conventional drugs they prescribe. Plus any drugs they prescribe for side-effects. Plus operation after operation after operation (I didn't know my brother very well - but, from what I was told, that would be stent operation, after stent operation, after bypass operation and don't forget the kidneys started to play up during this and hence more "treatment")

VERSUS
Finding out enough to have a good idea what's what for oneself and to make one's own decisions and then the ill person paying for themselves for books about it all, paying for themselves for whatever treatment they've decided for themselves, paying the extra costs involved in eating a healthier diet, etc, etc.

Logically, approach 2 costs the NHS a lot less - and costs the person themselves a lot more.

Food for thought! It would be rather nice for those of us taking the 2nd approach to have at least some help towards the costs of the "alternative" approach and the NHS would still be quids-in compared to someone taking the 1st approach and our own finances wouldn't take such a knock from having taken that approach.

Growing0ldDisgracefully

I was watching an alarming programme yesterday (can't remember which channel unfortunately) which was saying there is a strong g link between taking statins and increased incidence of dementia!

Does anyone have a link to this.

A quick look at the research seems to be at odds with this info.

A recent (2025) meta analysis finds differently
Statin use and dementia risk: A systematic review and updated meta‐analysis

This comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis demonstrates that statin use is associated with a significant reduction in the risk of dementia, including AD and VaD. Our study, encompassing over 7 million patients across 55 observational studies, provides robust evidence supporting the neuroprotective potential of statins.

alz-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/share/VH2DIBPXY9ME8WZUBMNM?target=10.1002/trc2.70039

Growingold
A link doesn’t mean a cause.
I didn’t see the programme you refer to, or the research the programme makers used as the basis for their argument.
But it could simply mean that more old people take statins. More old people have dementia. It follows that there is an increased incidence of dementia in people stating statins.
It doesn’t mean the statins have caused the dementia.
I think the study that Foxie refers to is far more likely to be a reliable source of information.

"A study published in The Lancet Regional Health suggests that statin use is associated with a lower risk of all-cause dementia and its subtypes in patients with heart failure (HF). Specifically, statin users had a 28% lower risk of Alzheimer's disease, a 18% lower risk of vascular dementia, and a 20% lower risk of unspecified dementia. Another study in The Lancet found that individuals 50 years and older prescribed statins had a substantially lower risk of developing dementia, according to The Lancet. "

I was watching an alarming programme yesterday (can't remember which channel unfortunately) which was saying there is a strong g link between taking statins and increased incidence of dementia!

Article today claims beetroot supplement and garlic tablets can reduce BP. The last time I took beetroot it upset my tummy.

... or go to Google scholar and read the research.

www.jacc.org/doi/abs/10.1016/j.jacc.2022.10.013

This is just one study (2023) (of many) looking at statins/ placebo/ red rice/ plant sterols.
If you read the linked articles you can find more interesting info re red yeasted rice

Comparative Effects of Low-Dose Rosuvastatin, Placebo, and Dietary Supplements on Lipids and Inflammatory Biomarkers

Google British Supplements and read the reviews on Plant Steriols. Game changer. Please do not take statins. They have also lowered what’s acceptable, so be wary.

Undines years ago, a friend listened to advice from someone who shared your thinking.
Instead of seeking the advice of a medical doctor she followed the advice from the*alternative medicine* person. Three weeks later
my friend was dead.
She was thirty three years old.
Her death could have been prevented!

I went onto statins reluctantly having read about some side effects etc. Thankfully I haven't suffered any. I'm also on BP meds and medication for diabetes. Personally I try to take my doctor's advice though I discuss concerns. I read around things and take supplements to try to avoid known side effects. For instance statins can deplete your co-enzyme Q10, which depletes as you age anyway, so I take a supplement.
As others have said, if you won't take your doctor's advice don't waste his or her time!
I have also talked to some knowledgeable people who reassured me about the benefits of statins - friends I studied Biochemistry with at university - and I trust their opinions perhaps more than my GP.

absolutely your choice, and, having lost both parents to a massive heart attack and stroke, it is not a bad way to go if you go. A friend's mum hung on for 12 years, doubly incontinent, in a wheelchair, unable to speak. I come from a long line of heart/stroke victims, it is in my dna, I eat healthily walk and cycle miles but that makes no difference. I have been on statins and bp tabs for years. I am grateful for modern medicine, in so many ways, it has saved my life several times, from dangerous birth of one of my children onwards. But your choice ....

What a load of rubbish you’ve spouted, Undines. My medic dd has not been trained by drug companies what a scurrilous and nasty thing to say.

'Safe' BP levels have come down and down over recent decades, to get more people on meds...'

I think the drive has been to save lives rather than to get people on meds. Whilst I wouldn't rule out alternative medications altogether, the practitioners don't practice just out of the goodness of their hearts, they do it to make money. Quite a lot of what they hand out has no proper research to back up the claims made. At least what the medics prescribe has had the research done and peer reviewed.

Absolute nonsense. Medical students are rigorously trained including in how to interpret good quality research

I don't believe GPs are, basically, trained by the drug companies
That is ridiculous.

Please could you evidence this?

Obviously drug companies are at conferences etc but training???

Well CariadAgain, I'm with you and at 74 keep well away from doctors and pills while the Great Mother preserves me! Oh yes, the white-coats are for the most part well-meaning, but they are, basically, trained by the drug companies, who fund goodness knows what, including of course most research. Yes of course they are 'expert' in what they've been told, but many of us question if it's the truth, including cardiologist Aseem Malhotra. But still take care of your health. 'Safe' BP levels have come down and down over recent decades, to get more people on meds, and Big Pharma laughing all the way to the bank. But if your BP is high, get it down naturally, there is an Ayurvedic herb, moktavati that can help. Have a very good diet, good supplements, consult alternative practitioners (also very highly trained, by organisations that do not have vested interests) and exercise regularly - you know all the usual advice. Sounds like you know the other bit of good advice - keep smiling!

I'm not sure what you're saying, Cumbrian123 - what do you mean please?

When your times up, it’s up, delay it with medications if you want, live every day as if it’s your last because one day- you’ll be right. Somethings going to get you.
You can be one of those who shuffles from appointment to appointment, this consultant that consultant unpleasant tests, hospital admissions , keeps everyone ,taxis, charity coffee shops, newspapers, crisps, sweets sugary drinks companies, and drug companies going I suppose.

I had a TIA in York district hospital, I wouldn't have known but I had my sister, a retired nurse visiting me at the time. The staff in the hospital weren't too bothered, which surprised me. I have to admit I wasn't taking my statins at the time. I do haveHigh cholesterol, but my blood pressure is on the low side of normal. At the moment I am waiting to be seen to decide which statin I should be taking

I was wondering the same myself 2507CO, Cariad had clearly made up her mind so what was the point unless it was to get all us grans twittering amongst ourselves - and she’s succeeded there! But love her chosen name anyway ….