High cholesterol/high blood pressure

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.

... 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

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

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!

"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. "

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.

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

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.

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.

You make me laugh Cariad

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....

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!

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!

NotSpaghetti

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!

Absolutely!

I now know what lines they're thinking along, that their approach is one of "tell me what to do - and expect me to obey", rather than "Present the options to the patient and patient decides what to do out of available options". I have the impression that, in their mind, there is the "One Route" and I had expected to be given options/told prognosis (and not just a doom-laden "You could have a stroke....as well as a heart attack""). All 3 medics involved had gone into medicine for all the right reasons as far as I could see - ie to help people. So their comments were indeed given due consideration.

I've already found they underestimate White Coat Syndrome. I knew about that anyway - and they told me it adds 5 points to the top reading. Errrr....nope....in my case they told me the top reading was 190 - I wondered why the little nurse went a bit white and so I asked her!!! (That is very high!) and when they did say to me "Read yours at home - 3 times daily - and no...do NOT do it when you know you feel calmer". Clue for home readings coming out high still - but around 140 - not the 190 at the hospital. So my White Coat Syndrome personally is an added 50 points!!!

There's stuff that they didn't ask about and I have recently developed what I thought was an unrelated symptom - and my own reading tells me that it could very well be related and it's one of the things heart failure can do to people. Well - at least that knocks that particular ailment off my "To Do" list and I'm not going to waste my time specifically focusing on that and will think "When I cure the heart failure - that should vanish too automatically".

I always want to know/indeed have been trained to ask for "both sides of the coin". Comes from being an ex-Quaker I guess - ie one of the ways of thinking is "There are always at least two sides to any question.....try and find out objective facts about a situation....and then make up your own mind. We anticipate you're an intelligent person". Yep....the church where I found a very factual/objective book in the "library" about recreational drug-taking. It was divided exactly 50% evenly - with the pros on the one hand and the cons on the other hand and then you were left to think for yourself. The plus side sounded interesting "You may have a nice trip". The minus side told you the costs/the health hazards/etc/etc. I read my way through both sides objectively - and then decided not to take any recreational drugs ever. Correct decision - in West Wales one meets a lot of former druggies.....well I certainly do anyway...and yep...I can see how wrecked their bodies and minds often are.

Obviously, we're all stupid and just believe real doctors rather than Dr Google. Good luck to you and your approach to health

”When I cure the heart failure..” unfortunately heart failure isn’t curable, but it is manageable with the help of medication, which you are refusing, so best of luck!

My friend has had A fib and heart failure for 6 or 7 years, and is on medication - she leads a pretty normal life, and hopes to do so for many more years.

There are indeed "real" online doctors to be found and I have found some - who are defo real doctors - up there that are not coming out with the "party line" - but are saying what they think/know of other approaches. I think we all learnt how to find them 2020 onwards - ie ones who do do research themselves personally. We had to - as a high proportion of doctors just transmitted what the Government said, rather than "I've investigated personally - and this is what I've found....".

Many of us have found ones who analyse what they're being told and then make up their own minds for themselves. Kudos to them for taking time out of their doubtless busy lives and being courageous enough to do so.

CariadAgain as the young say ,'You do you'. Believe what you want but don't expect others to agree.

A 75 I have decided to pay for a cardiologist to check me out fully to make sure there are no unexpected events as far as possible - nothing is guaranteed!. He did advise Statins in addition to basic hypertension medication. Cost to me around £500 a year.

My father had an unexpected heart attack, he was over 80 but otherwise in good health

David 49

I've seen all sorts going on heart-wise with every member of my direct family and heard of loads in less close ones. One thing I have seen too is the pressures relatives can put on people.

I knew this was what was happening - with my mother putting pressures on my father to accept HER decisions about HIS illness. I couldnt say anything and just had to sit and watch it - whilst generally letting him know my attitude was "You do you - you make your own decisions and don't let your wife/my mother make them for you". He got put through literally decades of all the "heart treatment" normal "run of events" - and so it's no wonder I'm very much of the mind that everyone should be "You do you" about things and I make no judgement either way. I just think "Their body = their choice".

"You do you" is basically my approach to pretty much every issue.

I think we all appreciate the right to choose, but I don’t understand why you started this thread?

Jaxjacky she was asking if anyone else who felt like her had been in her position.

Who else has been put in a similar situation - and what way did you deal with it "once and for all...= end of".

Maybe if people had read that (at the end of the OP) they would see what she was asking.

For myself, I have found consultants and a GP who will work with me and help me manage the risks I'm happy with. It's not a once and final solution but it's not what was recommended either.

After all, nothing is risk free!

I don’t think this thread has been useful to anyone, not least to Cariadagain who started it. It also has a slightly bad tempered feel about which I haven’t met before on my GN threads. Cariad what more do you want from us? You asked your question in your original post and received lots of answers. You then proceeded (or sounded to me) to get quite aggressive towards posters who weren’t on the same wavelength as you. I ask again, what more do you want from us?

She just wants us all to agree and thus validate her idiosyncratic views.

Cariad Has it not occurred to you that your father was fortunate to have those decades of life, even if he was ‘put through those things’.
My father died of a heart attack in 1976 and didn’t have a choice of whether he had any treatment or not. There wasn’t any.
He was 55, leaving my mother a widow at 53, never enjoyed what would have been a well-earned retirement, or saw any of his five grandchildren who he would have loved and who would have loved him.