Archive for the 'Drug Side Effects' Category

Taking Statins? Here is something your doctor should have told you.

Published on July 23, 2009 in Allopathic Treatments, Drug Side Effects, Statin Drugs and Vitamins: General. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , .

This isn’t your usual statin drug/big pharma bashing post. Statin drugs have done wonders for those suffering from high cholesterol levels and have helped lengthen the lives of people taking them. Statin drugs are some of the most widely used drugs today and this is evidenced by the fact that worldwide there was around $13 billion dollars in revenue from the sale of Lipitor alone (Forbes). However, there is an inherent risk in taking statin drugs. To understand the risk you need to know a little bit about how statin drugs work.

statins.jpg

While your diet contributes to cholesterol in the body, around 80% of the total cholesterol is synthesized in your liver. This is what makes Lipitor, Crestor, Vytorin, Caduaet and other statin drugs so effective.

cholesterol_production.gif

Cholesterol synthesis is a lengthy process that begins with a molecule called Acetyl-CoA which is used in various functions throughout the body. There are more steps than the those in the diagram above, but I removed the non-essential steps to help focus on how statins work. Once Acetyl-CoA is transformed into another substrate called HMG-CoA, statin drugs do their work. They inhibit an enzyme called HMG-CoA Reductase that transforms HMG-CoA into Mevalonate. Without mevalonate, which is the next substrate needed, cholesterol synthesis can no longer move forward. This is great news if you have hypercholesterolemia. But there is one small problem.

Somewhere alone the process of cholesterol synthesis is a substrate formed called Farnesyl-PP. This is an important substrate for the fact that it is needed to form two important compounds. Cholesterol is one and CoQ-10 is another. Statins stop the production of farnesyl-PP by inhibiting the process way back at the HMG-CoA step. So, it inhibits the production of both cholesterol (good) and CoQ-10 (very bad!).

Considering that CoQ-10 production is generally decreased the older we get, this inhibition by statin drugs is important because CoQ-10 is used in nearly every cell in the body. It is an essential anti-oxidant used in the production of ATP, which every cell in your body uses for energy. There has been some evidence that reduced CoQ-10 can even contribute to heart disease, has been used for treatment of migraines, cancer, hypertension and has shown to be beneficial for those following episodes of cardiac arrest. I’ve included some research papers at the end for further reading on these topics if you are interested.

So the long and short of it is, supplementation with CoQ-10 should be essential if you are on statin drugs and are even a good idea in those getting older in age or looking for a good anti-oxidant to supplement with. The thing that is interesting is that the medical community knows of this side effect, but rarely suggests supplementation of CoQ-10. So next time your in, ask your doctor about it.

Now I think I have written enough… see you next time.

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Lipid-lowering drugs and mitochondrial function: effects of HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors on serum ubiquinone and blood lactate/pyruvate ratio

Muscle Coenzyme Q10 Level in Statin-Related Myopathy

Influence of CoQ10 on Autonomic Nervous Activity and Energy Metabolism during Exercise in Healthy Subjects

Effect of coenzyme Q10 administration on endothelial function and extracellular superoxide dismutase in patients with ischaemic heart disease: a double-blind, randomized controlled study

Randomized, Double-blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial on Symptomatic Effects of Coenzyme Q10 in Parkinson Disease

Effect of Coenzyme Q10, Riboflavin and Niacin on Serum CEA and CA 15-3 Levels in Breast Cancer Patients Undergoing Tamoxifen Therap

Coenzyme Q10 Combined With Mild Hypothermia After Cardiac Arrest

Coenzyme Q10 improves blood pressure and glycaemic control: a controlled trial in subjects with type 2 diabetes

Do You Think This Flu Shot Representative Still has Her Job?

Published on November 18, 2008 in Allopathic Treatments, Drug Side Effects, Flu/Influenza and Vaccine. 1 Comment Tags: , , , , , .

I can not vouch for the authenticity of this movie, but it sounds pretty real. If it is, it says a lot about the garbage the pharmaceutical industry is selling you. I particularly like the part where she admits that she doesn’t take the vaccine and then quickly asks “Why are you asking me that?” Hilarious!

I’m not trying to be a Big Pharma basher. I think they do a lot of good in the world, but every company has to make money, right?

I personally never get a flu shot. The reason the flu comes around every year and we never develop an immunity to it is because the influenza virus, which causes the flu, mutates so fast that by the time it comes around every year it is different enough from the strain the year before that our body does not recognize it and can not act fast enough to prevent infection. This is called “antigenic drift.” The mutations are small but different enough to cause illness.

Vaccine makers base their vaccines off of strains the year before and the virus that appears in China and East Europe before it makes it to the western world. So it is really hit or miss. If they guess right the vaccine works. If they guess wrong and the virus mutates enough, the vaccine is nearly worthless as our body will not recognize the new virus and can not react to it fast enough. I personally don’t think it is worth the risk. I have never had a flu vaccine and have gotten the flu a total of once. I’d say those are pretty good odds. I would much rather keep my immune system strong and if I do happen to get the flu, fight it off naturally.

One instance in which I would get a vaccine is viruses like the large pandemics of Influenza like the Spanish flu of 1918 that killed 20 to 40 million people worldwide that are cause by large mutations called “antigenic shifts.” These mutations are so drastic that it is almost completely different from the virus it came from. These new antigenic shift mutations are highly virulent and cause severe illness. The scare of the “bird flu” is due to an antigenic shift. While highly virulent in humans, it has yet to mutate to a form highly transmissible to humans. Once it does, it will spread like wild fire and cause serious illness and probably lots of deaths. If a vaccine became available at that point, the risk would definitely be worth the reward, in my opinion.

Rheumatoid Arthritis

Published on October 22, 2008 in Allergy, Allopathic Treatments, Auto-Immune Disease, Drug Side Effects, Omega-3 and Rheumatoid Arthritis. 3 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

My wife has pretty severe Rheumatoid Arthritis and has tried many different treatments. She was started off on daily doses of methotrexate (a chemotherapy drug) and prednisone (a corticosteroid). This worked well until she started losing all of her hair, felt weak and tired, and decided we needed to try something else.

She had started a new job which had good health insurance, so her Rheumatologist decided to put her on Humira, a monthly injection which, according to their website:

HUMIRA is a medicine called a TNF blocker, a type of protein that blocks the action of TNF-α, a substance made by your body’s immune system. People with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) have too much TNF-α in their bodies. The extra TNF-α can attack normal healthy body tissue and cause inflammation especially in the tissues of your bones, cartilage, and joints. HUMIRA can help block the damage that too much TNF-α can cause. HUMIRA may prevent further damage to the bones and joints of moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis patients, and may help the ability to perform daily activities.

Humira worked GREAT for her, She felt fantastic just days after her first injection. However, one warning which states you should call your physician immediately is “warm, red, or painful skin.” After her second injection she developed a serious skin rash which was a reaction to the drug and use was discontinued.

So now she was not taking any medication while waiting for insurance to approve a different treatment of Remicade. Her RA got so bad she had trouble with normal activities of daily living. She was in serious pain and absolutely miserable. Remicade is another (in fact one of the first) TNF blockers and according to their website:

REMICADE targets specific proteins in the body’s immune system to help control the development of inflammation, significantly reducing painful symptoms in diseases such as plaque psoriasis, rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis, adult Crohn’s disease, pediatric Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, and ankylosing spondylitis.

Remicade worked well for awhile. It wasn’t as effective as Humira was and instead of a monthly injection that you could do at home required a trip to the hospital for a monthly IV infusion. It did work well enough to continue using until her body began to develop anti-bodies against the drug. Her rheumatologist stated she had only heard about a couple of other patients that this happened with so once again treatment stopped.

We increased her Omega-3 supplementation to help keep the inflammation down until insurance approved yet another drug: Orencia.

Orencia is also a monthly infusion at the hospital but instead of blocking TNF, “works in a fundamentally different way than any other rheumatoid arthritis treatment. ORENCIA works early in the RA inflammatory process at the T-cell level and can reduce the activation of T cells, which reduces the activation of other cells in the RA inflammatory process.”

T-Cells are an important white blood cell that are crucial to your bodies immune system. They help fight viral and bacterial infections. And that is the power (and the problem) behind Orencia: it lowers your immune system so that it can not attack your own body (as is seen in auto-immune diseases). In fact, that is how ALL RA treatments work. They don’t fix or heal or cure RA, they lower your immune system so that it can’t damage your own body as much.

This is great if you are in serious pain and having trouble simply walking or cutting your food or sleeping because the pain is so intense. But there are serious side effects that come along with this. This list is from the Orencia Website:

Possible Side Effects of ORENCIA® (abatacept)
ORENCIA can cause serious side effects including:

Serious infections. Patients receiving ORENCIA have a higher chance of getting infections including pneumonia, and other infections caused by viruses, bacteria, or fungi. Call your doctor immediately if you feel sick or get any of the following signs of infection: fever, feel very tired, cough, feel flu-like, or warm, red or painful skin.

Allergic reactions. Allergic reactions can happen on the day of treatment or the day after receiving ORENCIA. Tell your doctor or get emergency medical help right away if you have hives, swollen face, eyelids, lips, tongue, throat or trouble breathing.

Cancer (malignancies). Certain kinds of cancer have been reported in patients receiving ORENCIA. It is not known if ORENCIA increases your chance of getting certain kinds of cancer.

Vaccinations. You should not receive ORENCIA with certain types of vaccines. ORENCIA may cause some vaccinations to be less effective.

Respiratory problems in patients with COPD. You may get certain respiratory problems more often if you receive ORENCIA and have COPD, including: worsened COPD, pneumonia, cough, or trouble breathing.

The more common side effects with ORENCIA in both adults and children are headache, upper respiratory tract infection, sore throat, and nausea. Other side effects in children may include diarrhea, cough, fever, and abdominal pain.

This list is pretty standard for Remicade, Humira, Enbrel, and other RA drug treatments.

So we decided to do something different. She is still on Orencia which is working decent, but we recently went to a Chiropractor that talked at my school who specializes in internal medicine as well. He stated that he treats RA almost exclusively as an allergic reaction to something we eat. He draws blood for a test called ELISA/ACT which is an allergy test for over 450 different things including common things we eat, preservatives, food coloring, and environmental factors.

He got the results back the other day and called to tell her to immediately cease and desist the eating of all dairy, peanuts, ginseng, bakers yeast and of all things: chicken.

We are going in tonight to talk to him in person and get the details about the test and put together a game plan to try to make her better. The beautiful thing about this, is that instead of just minimizing the progression of the disease like the chemotheraputic approach, it actually removes the cause of the disease and hence… the disease itself!

We are hoping that this works well enough to get her off all drug treatments and back to normal, healthy, pain free living. We are really excited about this and will post from time to time about her progress and how things are working. Until then, Live Happy Live Healthy!

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