It’s always good to take a clear-eyed look at the risks and benefits of a medicine
Dear Dr. Roach: I am a 69-year-old female. Recently, I had some blood work done, and my doctor decided to put me on Lipitor based on my LDL results. After reading the side-effects, I am hesitant to take the drug. My LDL level is 128 mg/dL, my HDL is 49 mg/dL, and my total cholesterol is 192 mg/dL. Over the years, my numbers go up and down. I feel that if I controlled my diet better, I could get my LDL level down without medication.
Improving your diet is always a good idea no mater your cholesterol levels, because a healthy diet has independent benefits on the heart and in many other conditions, as does regular exercise. Assuming you have normal blood pressure, kidney function, and BMI, the model predicts that you have an 8.8% chance of a cardiovascular event in 10 years. These are pretty good odds, a better-than-91% chance that your heart will be fine when you are 79. Your cholesterol isn’t bad, and most of your risk just comes from the fact that you are 69. Age is the major risk factor for heart disease.
You also need to consider the possible harm from taking Lipitor or another statin. You have probably read that some people will notice muscle aches, which is true. However, in studies where people don’t know whether they are taking a statin, people were just as likely to say that they had muscle aches while taking an inactive placebo pill.
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