Statins

[Ivor the Engineer]

So what happens when, as I said at the beginning of this, a fat person just misses the "target" weight that you've decided is "good" and their cholesteral level and ratio is still not ideal - in your system they are stuffed (pun intended)!

How is my system different in this respect to the one we have now? You still have to meet arbitrary criteria before you are prescribed statins. What if you only have a 19% risk, rather than a 20% risk in the next 10 years of a CVD event under the current system?

Just for clarification, decisions would not be based on hard targets, they would be based on reality E.g., if a slightly overweight person came in with a cholesterol level of 13mmol/l, they have a cholesterol problem which would be unlikely to be much affected by their lifestyle and would get statins. If a obese person came in with a cholesterol level of 7mmol/l, they would be treated for their obesity, rather than be given statins.

I've just had a look if I kept the link and I didn't - but in a debate awhile ago someone did bring up a study that showed that for many classes of diseases (including CVD) social-economic grouping is a "risk factor" regardless of other criteria such as weight, smoking and so on.

But you are again being inconsistent- if I am in a "lower" social economic group I can change my life to change that just like I can change my life if I am fat so why is it only if I'm fat you would not allow me free statins?

A health system can only be expected to deal with physical and mental problems associated with an individual's health. Or should doctors be advising their patients to live in Japan?

 

[casebro]

So far as cholesterol as a risk factor for heart disease, I believe it is #5. Ahead of it are: Age, Weight, Family history, and Height. It would make more sense to cut two inches out of your femurs than to take statins.

OK, so it's the #1 CONTROLLABLE risk factor. Being #5 makes it barely worth while. Which is born out by the studies.

 

[Ivor the Engineer]

So far as cholesterol as a risk factor for heart disease, I believe it is #5. Ahead of it are: Age, Weight, Family history, and Height. It would make more sense to cut two inches out of your femurs than to take statins.

OK, so it's the #1 CONTROLLABLE risk factor. Being #5 makes it barely worth while. Which is born out by the studies.

It's a bit old (1998), but this has some interesting information on chlesterol and heart disease.

Of particular interest are figs. 4 and 5. Should we all be aiming for a total cholesterol of less than 3.5mmol/l? What are the side effects (if any) of a serum cholesterol level this low?