Re: Lack of evidence for LDL treatment targets

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David Rind wrote:

It's not the only benefit demonstrated to date -- they also decrease recurrent cardiac events. The reason for focusing on mortality is that it's generally the most important benefit to people.

I think quality of life is the most important benefit to most people.
As a type 2 DM (tightly controlled by diet with no meds) I don't care so much about how long I live, I care that my vision, kidney function, nerves and mental faculties (impaired though they are) last as long as I do.

There's more to think about here, more things that are linked. Metabolic syndrome, the epidemic of pediatric "adult onset" DM, rising rates of kidney disease, pancreatic, colon, prostate, breast and ovarian cancers, heart disease, infertility, etc. There's linkage here, and researchers are still content to be play Blind Men and The Elephant.

Statins haven't been tested head to head against every other possible intervention, but that misses the history of treatments for high cholesterol in patients with and without known heart disease.

Over the past 40 years, lots of treatments were tried (including diets, vitamins, and all sorts of medications developed by the very same drug companies that make statins) and the results on mortality almost always showed either no effect or harm. All this changed when the statins came along. It's not like the same drug companies didn't have a financial stake in showing that those other medications worked -- it's just that they actually didn't work and the trials showed it.

Over the last 40 years, all the pharma and conventional practitioners have embraced a low fat diet for CVD prevention despite the fact that there's never been a single well controlled study demonstrating that fat, saturated or otherwise, promotes CVD. Then, when the recommended diet promoted CVD (and obesity and an explosion of type 2 DM even in children) they started shoving drugs at the public, who can't reach the phony targets without ever increasing doses of them. Then, when folks get achey, lethargic, mentally fuzzy, their docs say it's anything *but* the statin. Statins are part of the problem, the "take this pill, it's new and better" mentality. They're not better, they're just the latest mistake.

Shortsighted, narrowminded, wrongheaded and pathetic inside the box thinking gets us crap for our research dollars, which the NIH keeps shoveling over to profit making pharma corps.

Susan

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Relevant Pages

  • Re: Lack of evidence for LDL treatment targets
    ... As a type 2 DM (tightly controlled by diet with no meds) I don't care ... companies that make statins) and the results on mortality almost ... fat, saturated or otherwise, promotes CVD. ... new and better" mentality. ...
    (sci.med.cardiology)
  • Re: Do drugs {including statins} and procedures benefit women and men equally?
    ... Bottom line to me is that the HPS study *suggests* that equally at risk ... statement that statins have even less value for women than for men. ... mortality effects have ever been seen in women. ... on gender-specific total mortality with lipid therapy have ...
    (sci.med.cardiology)
  • Re: One more safe alternative to statins
    ... >:: statins do not improve all cause mortality in the elderly. ... >:: could be something unrelated to cholesterol.) ... > women in relation to age and cause of death. ...
    (sci.med.cardiology)
  • Re: Woman and statins - A good debate
    ... statins are unrelated to their effects on LDL. ... also been shown to influence CV events and I believe overall mortality ... In primary prevention trials, statins have NOT ... ALLHAT had so much noncompliance with assigned treatment that it is ...
    (sci.med.cardiology)
  • Re: Fish oils plus statins help protect heart (Article reprint)
    ... ::: those taking statins. ... :: The question how much reduction statins provide in those who are ... the risk of CHD 33% compared with patients randomized to diet alone. ... Effect of Different Antilipidemic Agents and Diets on Mortality ...
    (sci.med.cardiology)