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Hi, Dr Peter Osborne here with web wellness update, and.
Today I want to give you a lesson on cholesterol medications. There's a group
of medications that doctors commonly prescribed, frequently prescribed.
And those medications are called statins.
And so statin drugs are designed to
inhibite particular enzyme in your body. The enzymes job is to
produce the molecule cholesterol.
In a nutshell, statins blocked the production of cholesterol, thus lowering the cholesterol,
the theory going reduce cholesterol, reduce the risk of developing cardiovascular disease.
However there's a dirty little secret about statins that you should be aware of.
The first one is this: side-effect of statins most commonly is muscular weakness and muscular pain.
But there's actually a mechanism
where that is induced. That mechanism is the statins actually deplete
something called CoQ10 or Co-Enzyme Q10. You may have seen this.
It's very common supplement that is sold in health food stores, it's sold in supplement stores.
CoQ10 or Co-Enzyme Q10 is a nutrient that your body can make, but when you take the statin drug it also
blocks your body's ability to produce CoQ10. You see, cholesterol
makes CoQ10 so we blocked cholesterol by default we blocked the production of this nutrient.
Why is that important for somebody who is trying to reduce the risk of heart disease?
Here's how.
CoQ10 deficiency, so coQ10 is low, what we end up getting?
Is we end up getting a couple problems: one, CoQ10 deficiency - long-term -
can actually cause congestive heart failure.
It's been very well studied, it's very well documented in the number of
peer-reviewed medical journals, the CoQ10 deficiency actually causes the heart muscle
to become weak and so we end up having, is we end up having
the development of a weak heart muscle or for the congestive heart failure in this is what leads to
the swelling of the ankles and the swelling of the feet.
So that's one element that we see when we artificially lower CoQ10. So again,
here remember the point of taking a statins is that we're trying to reduce heart disease.
So if we're taking a statins to reduce cholesterol and therefore reduce heart diseases.
But it's causing CoQ10 deficiency in creating a congestive heart failure issue.
How much ground have we actually gained?
So that's one element of what a CoQ10 deficiency can bring us. The other thing
that CoQ10 deficiency can cause.
It can cause high blood pressure.
This is also been very well studied, very well documented.
So well documented actually some of the companies that produce statins actually
have a patent on the drug with CoQ10 as part of it. Patents, they haven't
actually produced those drugs on the market yet because the theory is
that they're waiting for these patents, current patents to expire and then
they're going to bring out CoQ10 mixed with statins. They're going to have a new patents
that nobody else can copy so they can protect their revenue. But anyway,
CoQ10 deficiency can also cause high blood pressure. Of course remember
what is our goal. Our goal is to reduce heart disease. So now
we taken a drug to reduce heart disease and we can induce is potentially two
different mechanisms that lead to heart problems. Now there's a third element here
with CoQ10 deficiency. And that's third element has to do with the other side effect
of a CoQ10 deficiency, and that is, it causes muscular loss
and muscle weakness.
Let's think about that in terms of how that affects a person.
Let's say I'm a sixty year old man taking a statin
and I've been taking it for a couple of years to keep my cholesterol down. In
over to your timeframe my muscles has atrophied, they've gotten weaker.
Okay?
And as my muscles are gotten weaker, I've become less active because
it's harder for me to walk up the stairs, it's harder for me to go on a vacation
and hike, it's harder for me to ride my bike and lose my weights, because my
muscles are atrophied and weaker. So what happens when we've reduced our exercise?
Well, when we reduce our exercise we end up
increasing our risk for heart disease. So again, the synopsis hear is:
we're taking a drug, we're taking a cholesterol-lowering drug to reduce the risk,
not to reduce heart disease but to reduce the risk of developing heart disease.
And in doing so mean inhibited a nutrient CoQ10.
CoQ10 deficiency can cause congestive heart failure, high blood pressure, muscle weakness,
which in turn lead to an inactivity which increases our risk of heart disease.
How much sense is that actually make?
So my advice to you is, take this information to your doctor.
You can Google search CoQ10 deficiency and statin. You can pull up
more information that you know what to do with,
but take this information to your doctor.
And see if he doesn't have a different solution for you, other than giving you
a statin drug in telling you that your cholesterol is high you're just gonna
have to take this drug for the rest your life.
Hope you found this useful. Doctor Osborne, have a great day!