Not Naturally Healthy

Cholesterol is something many of us need to start dealing with.  After all, a lot of our favorite foods contain so much of it. Good, bad, we’ve all got to manipulate cholesterol levels the right way to get the right ratio.  Cholesterol treatments and cholesterol medications abound for the careful consumer, ranging from generic statins to specific statin medications.

Anyone who wants to take care of their cholesterol levels needs to know what statins are, what statin effects there are when you use it and if there are any side effects of statin that you should know about.  Cholesterol isn’t something to be trifled with and is a concern that simply grows more and more important as time goes by.

But First, What is Cholesterol?

Cholesterol is known for the most part as being a fatty substance.  Despite its bad reputation, it’s actually an important part of the internal organs of animals and people.  There are two sources of cholesterol: food and from the liver.  There is such a thing as good cholesterol, though.  HDL cholesterol is, in fact, good for you as it eliminates the bad stuff that bad or LDL cholesterol leaves in your heart, the stuff that actually causes heart disease.

Cholesterol Medications

Before cholesterol treatments, doctors will first suggest lifestyle changes to make sure that their cholesterol is maintained at proper levels .  This includes various changes in diet that has less cholesterol content, the cessation of some very nasty habits, such as smoking, and the increase in exercise and overall physical activity.

Cholesterol medications can only work well if these lifestyle changes are also applied.  Medications include statins, fibrates and nicotinic acid agents.  Using these things together will lead to a greatly reduced risk of heart disease.

Statin Medications

For a lot of people, especially younger people, this might actually be the first time they’ve heard of the word statins.  Statin effects include reducing the body’s cholesterol production.  If you’ve got a problem with high levels of LDL cholesterol, statins are the best cholesterol medications to reduce those levels.  Statins basically increase your liver’s ability to clean out all the bad cholesterol running around in your blood stream and increases its ability to release HDL, the good cholesterol.

The best statin effects obviously are the ones on your heart as it reduces the risk of a lot of heart conditions like a heart attack to other issues like strokes and anything else that LDL cholesterol can cause.  Statin effects appear within a month or a month and a half of constant intake.

Statin Side Effects

While statin works wonders on cholesterol, it carries with it some side effects as with all medications.  Being pregnant pretty much means that statins are off limits to you.  It also means that you shouldn’t take statins if you’re breastfeeding.  Liver and kidney issues also push out the possibility of using statins.

Most statin side effects fall into one of two categories: skeletal muscle damage and pain or raised liver enzymes.

The muscle set of statin side effects tends to crop up with symptoms such as aching shoulders and or leg muscle pain.  This is caused by muscle breakdown or degeneration called Rhadamyolysis.  This degeneration is a bad enough side effect.  It can actually lead to death if left unchecked as it can quickly overload and heavily damage your kidneys.  In fact, Baycol, which had statins, was taken out because it was directly responsible for at least sixty deaths.

Some people have even experienced slight to severe memory loss after using statins.  While statin effects do include reduced risk of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s, statin side effects are starting to include cognitive damage or defects.

Generic Statins

Generic statins are a boon to everyone who wants statins but haven’t the fat wallets to purchase them.  Chemically, they are built the same way and, thus, can serve anyone who wants to lower their high LDL levels and are much cheaper.  In less than a year in fact, Lipitor, which is one of the world’s leading statin supplements, will have its patent expire and, thus, consumers will find a generic version available.

Unfortunately, the aforementioned statin side effects still apply.

Fighting Cholesterol

Cholesterol management is best handled with the first suggestion any doctor’s gonna give you and with a conscious decision and commitment to making your life healthier.  A healthy lifestyle is the best because all its effects are good.  While statins can easily save your heart, it can also potentially rob you of the rest of your body or even your mind.

When choosing whether or not to start on cholesterol medications, you need to weigh both the pros and cons.  The risks, after all, can make any gains you want be pointless, considering how devastating and fatal those risks are.  Of course, there are risks when it comes to medicine.  It’s really up to you which is more risky: taking or not taking the medicine.  Nothing is ever certain in life.  Always consult your doctor, get family support and face the consequences.