Dr Le Fanu draws attention to problems with regard to drugs prescribed for elderly hospital patients

Dr Le Fanu draws attention to problems with regard to drugs prescribed for elderly hospital patients to take when they leave hospital, particularly if they have memory or cognitive impairment, which, he reminds us, "can be caused or exacerbated by medication, particularly the cholesterol-lowering statins."

Dr LeFanu talks sense about the effects of advertising antidepressants

Read Dr LeFanu's article in the Telegraph. You will see that brand advertising techniques have been the main driver in increasing the prescribing of antidepressants. I remind you that antidepressants work no better than dummy pills but unlike dummy pills, antidepressants can and do cause many harmful side-effects, including weight gain and breast tenderness. It shocks me that bearing all these facts in mind doctors still prescribe this pharmaceutical junk and, indeed, that they are allowed still to prescribe antidepressants. The health service could save a lot of money by no longer prescribing these pills and by no longer having the consequent adverse side-effects on health to have to deal with. More importantly, if these harmful pills were no longer prescribed it would save a lot of avoidable illness and suffering.

MIND, the mental health charity, recommends a walk in the country as being helpful in lifting depression. I personally would also recommend avoiding salt and salty food and optimising nutrition. And very importantly, if you are dieting by eating less food than your body requires, I urge you to give it up! - Dieting is harmful to your health. It is a frequent cause of depression and does not reduce obesity.

Jane Akre's blogpage about Medical Negligence is well worth reading

I recommend Jane Akre's webpage: Five Myths about Medical Negligence as a welcome antidote to the misinformation commonly promulgated by powerful interested parties.

This article by the British medical doctor, James LeFanu, in the Telegraph, adds ballast to the subject matter: Arrogant Doctors.

Anybody who believes that doctors are hard-working, all-knowing saints should read this:

Dr LeFanu's Telegraph entertaining article on stupid, arrogant doctors.

I've been interested in recent months to notice that people who complain about unsatisfactory or negligent treatment often tend to be disparagingly referred to by doctors or their retinues as 'disgruntled patients'. Bearing in mind the sort of serious matters that occasion the complaints that dissatisfied patients make - having read the Telegraph article for instance - 'disgruntled' seems a very inapposite adjective to use. It is so inapposite and disparaging, and yet so commonly used, it makes me wonder whether medical students are actually taught to use the word as a put-down to damaged patients...

Doctors who prescribe statins do not always warn patients of the adverse side-effects they may suffer.

Dr James LeFanu gives a further warning against the potential harm from taking statin medication.

Adverse side-effects from pharmaceutical drugs are very common. If, for instance, you gain a lot of weight after starting to take a pharmaceutical drug, it is most likely that it is the result of taking the drug, and the weight gain would be reduced by reducing salt intake, since the weight that is gained is mainly salt and water. My website explains all about this.

Lose weight, reduce your risk of most cancers, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, heart disease, heart attack, vascular dementia, stroke, osteopenia, osteoporosis, hypercholesterolaemia, depression, liver and kidney problems, and improve your health in many other ways without drugs, hunger or expense by eating less salt! - Try it! - You will feel so much better! See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk
The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.

And see Sodium in foods

Another warning of the harm done by prescribed medications, e.g. Zestril

Dr James LeFanu: Second Opinion

Extract from the article in the Sunday Telegraph:

"Suddenly feeling unwell? It's probably your medicine, writes James LeFanu

The news this week that drugs used in the treatment of Parkinson's can turn people of impeccable character into pathological gamblers is a reminder that medication is the likely culprit for any novel or unusual symptom.

Surprisingly, this most reliable rule of thumb is often overlooked by doctors, as a lady from New South Wales discovered when prescribed Zestril for raised blood pressure. After six months she began to have "extremely debilitating" episodes of nausea, vomiting and abdominal pain. A gut specialist did all the usual tests and, finding nothing wrong, recommended the fashionable high-fibre diet.

Another six months elapsed with a further dozen or so episodes till she woke one morning with a terrifying swelling of the lips and tongue - diagnosed as the allergic condition angio oedema, which she was advised was caused by house dust mites. She says this "did not ring true", and on further investigation she found that both the tongue swelling and bowel symptoms were known side-effects of Zestril. Besides the gut specialist she had consulted four other doctors "but not one had made the connection"."

One wonders which is worse - the serious/harmful/dangerous side-effects of prescribed drugs, or the medical profession's scandalously widespread ignorance about them!...)o:

Note: Prescription drugs and doctors' lack of knowledge/understanding about their adverse side-effects are major causes of morbid obesity and all the many illnesses associated with obesity.

Lose weight and improve your health in many ways without drugs or expense by eating less salt! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!

See my website http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/.html (The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/steroids.html

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/ami.html

vulnerable groups

How to Lose weight!

Children and Obesity

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

See Sodium in foods and

Associated health conditions and

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/story.html - my 'political' page

I can be contacted via my website if you need my further help. My help is free.

All men over 50 'should be offered heart pills' is the foolish opinion of the Government's heart tsar!

All men over 50 'should be offered heart pills' - Independent

Extract:

"Every man over 50 should be offered a pill to cut their risk of a heart attack, according to the Government's heart tsar.

Mass medication of the population would be the best way of cutting Britain's high rate of deaths due to cardiovascular disease, which claims more than 200,000 lives a year, said Roger Boyle, the National Director for Heart Disease.

But he acknowledged that the public was not yet ready to accept such an approach which would turn millions of "healthy" people into patients and draw accusations of a nanny state.

He called for a public debate on the pros and cons of "medicalising" the population by treating millions more people with statins - drugs to reduce cholesterol which are already saving thousands of lives. For women, whose risk is lower, treatment would be offered at the age of 60, he suggested.

Statins have been described as wonder drugs because they can reduce the risk of a heart attack or stroke by a third, if the dose used is high enough, and have few side-effects. Three million patients are taking statins in England, which are preventing an estimated 10,000 deaths a year at an annual cost of £550m.

The number is set to double to six million patients under new guidance lowering the threshold for treatment published by the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (Nice) in June.

Dr Boyle, who takes a statin himself - "the cheapest available" - said that since the mid- 1990s, when Britain was the heart disease capital of the world, the death rate had fallen by 36 per cent, thanks in part to the increased use of statins.

"It is not perfect yet but we have seen substantial improvement," he said. "We now need to move on. Despite the reduction in the death rate, cardiovascular disease is still the main cause of death, more than for all cancers combined. We have still got a huge task. We may no longer be the cardiovascular disease capital of the world but in a nation such as ours we ought to be achieving optimal results.""

Dr James LeFanu's articles (click on tab below this post) on the adverse side-effects of statins have made clear that they are at best a very mixed blessing, and at worst no blessing at all.

Cholesterol levels can be safely lowered at no cost and without drugs by lowering intake of salt and salty food. This would also, independently, lower high blood pressure and obesity, lower the risk of developing late onset diabetes, stroke and heart disease/attack and many other degenerative conditions including most cancers.

It's what you could call 'a no-brainer'...(o:

Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
How to Lose weight!

See my website http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/.html
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

See Sodium in foods and Associated health conditions

I can be contacted via my website if you need my further help. My help is free.

I listened to Humphrey Hawksley on BBC Radio 4 this morning. He was one of the contributors to the excellent "From Our Own Correspondent".

This is the webpage about today's programme: From Our Own Correspondent and this Humphrey Hawksley's talk on From Our Own Correspondent in fact is Humphrey Hawksley's talk, which I found very interesting.

In the discussion about statins there was no mention of their adverse effects, to which Dr James Le Fanu has been drawing attention in recent months. - See Dr James LeFanu's findings about the bad effects of statins

High cholesterol levels are not, of course, caused by lack of statins...(o: - Nor, in fact, by eating foods containing high cholesterol or saturated fats. High cholesterol and also high blood pressure are mainly caused by sodium/salt sensitivity and can be significantly lowered by eating less salt and salty food. - This costs nothing and is completely safe, unlike taking statins...

Heart disease is also best treated or avoided by cutting out salt and salty food.

Lose weight, lower your high cholesterol level, reduce your risk of heart disease and heart attack, and benefit your health in countless other ways by eating less salt! - Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better! -

How to Lose weight!

See Sodium in foods

Visit my website http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/
See http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/conditions.html
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

I see that Humphrey Hawksley has a website: http://www.hhawksley.co.uk/

More about the benefits of giving up statins...

They're all going on a statin holiday - Dr James LeFanu writing in The Sunday Telegraph

Dr LeFanu gives further evidence of the health and wellbeing benefits of patients who have given up taking their prescribed statins. - Of one woman he writes: "Since the start of her statin holiday a month ago, she sleeps well, with greatly increased energy, her rashes have cleared, her hair has regained its lift, her memory has improved and her writing skills returned. Her family doctor, she says, is "amazed". Those interested should read Dr Malcolm Kendrick's witty The Great Cholesterol Con (ISBN 978-1-84454-360-1)."

You can safely reduce cholesterol levels by minimising your intake of salt and salty food. There is sufficient sodium and chloride for the body's needs in fresh, unsalted food and drink without salting it. This will also lower the risk/severity of many other conditions of ill-health and you will find you have much more energy and vitality. - See http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/conditions.html and
http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/sodium_foods.html

Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

More criticism of statins: - doubts are being raised over whether statins really live up to the hype about them

So much for the wonder drug - Sunday Telegraph

Extracts:

"More than three per cent of the population are now taking statins, at a cost to the NHS of £730 million last year. They have gained the reputation of being something of a wonder drug and are now prescribed not just for patients already suffering from heart disease but also for those identified as being at risk of developing cardiac problems in the future. The Government claims that its policy of encouraging the prescription of statins saves up to 7,000 lives a year.

Now, though, doubts are being raised over whether statins really live up to the hype. Dr James LeFanu, medical columnist of The Sunday Telegraph, highlighted the issue a month ago - and has since received more than 400 letters from readers who have had a less than happy experience with the drugs."

"So far, the Government and the medical establishment disagree with Dr LeFanu and those patients who have stopped taking their statins. The biggest British study into the effectiveness of the drug, published in The Lancet five years ago, followed 20,536 patients who took simvastatin or a placebo over five years. It concluded that for high-risk patients, the drug could cut the risk of heart attacks, strokes or the need for surgery to unblock arteries by about one third. Critically, it said prescribing should be widened to cover increasing numbers of patients, because it had been shown the drug was "so well tolerated and safe".

But the study, funded by the Medical Research Council and the British Heart Foundation, was unusual in one significant respect. Of 63,603 patients screened to take part in the trial, about half - 32,145 - were selected as eligible. Of these, more than one third were subsequently excluded, following a "run-in period" where they tried the drug for up to six weeks. Reasons for their exclusion varied. Overall, 26 per cent either dropped out or were deemed by researchers to be unlikely to keep taking the drugs for the full five years. A further 10 per cent were excluded because their GPs warned of increased risks due to existing health conditions. Others were excluded because of apparent side-effects, such as rising levels of liver enzymes and creatine, and, in some cases, developing muscle weakness.

So, of the 63,603 initially selected, only 20,536 continued - a mere 32 per cent. The chairman of the British Heart Foundation, Professor Peter Weissberg, admits: "It tried everyone on the drug and only the ones who didn't have side-effects were continued. That is unusual, but dozens of other trials have looked at this in a more standard way and have concluded that the side-effects are not major. One of the problems with clinical trials will always be the drop-out rate. The key thing to establish with this trial was: if you take this drug, does it save your life or not? It concluded that it does.""

It's also worth looking at relative risk and number needed to treat

Lose weight AND lower your high cholesterol level AND lower your risk of heart attack by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

Just a little bit more about statins and the benefits of no longer taking them...

On today's Letters Page of the Sunday Telegraph - Letters Page - there is the following letter:

"I threw away my statins after reading Dr James LeFanu (Second Opinion, March 18) and I am a new man. The insufferable total fatigue, the aches and pains, the fainting fits, and more have all gone. I want to tell everyone!

D J T Williams, Shurdington, Gloucestershire"

That's good news! - And since the writer wants 'to tell everyone' I don't suppose s/he minds my copying the letter into this blogpost...(o:

And here is a bit more about statins that is in Dr LeFanu's Second Opinion article in the Sunday Telegraph today:

"Finally, a couple of FAQs on the great statin issue. Could they be causing my aching hips, irritability, skin rash, forgetfulness, etc? Perhaps, but not necessarily: the only way to find out is to give them a rest.

Can stopping them suddenly be dangerous? No, the hazards they are meant to protect against, while real, are long-term."


Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

More about the dangers of statins and the ignorance of doctors about the devastating symptoms they cause when prescribed to lower cholesterol levels.

The deeper I go into it, the fishier statins seem to become - Dr James LeFanu - Sunday Telegraph

Extract:

"Statins again, whose mass prescription is turning out to be much more serious (and sinister) than I could have supposed.

The response to my last two columns has been, almost literally, overwhelming, so why are doctors apparently so unaware of the devastating symptoms they can cause? The British Heart Foundation (whose chairman, Professor Peter Weissberg accused me last week of being "easily led" on this matter) claims that statins have "minimal side effects" compared to those taking controlled (or placebo) drugs. And, indeed, several major trials report an astonishingly low incidence, of around 0.5 per cent, of the commonest side-effects of severe muscular aches and pains, both in those taking statins and those taking the placebo.

This seems staggeringly unlikely, the more so since a recent survey of 5,000 patients taking statins, conducted for a Dutch television programme, produced a rather different figure of 27 per cent, That would mean that nearly a million people are affected by statin-induced muscular pains and reduced mobility. It is not necessary to be a conspiracy merchant to suspect that something fishy is going on here.

The need to find out what is really happening is all the more urgent as medical leaders and prominent cardiologists are now pressing for a yet lower "ideal" cholesterol level, with a target of less than four, which will catch yet more millions in the statin trap. Several readers report that their family doctors have already doubled the doses of their drugs in the last six months. The time has surely come, with such vast sums of public money at stake, for questions in the House."

There should also be questions in the House about the reckless overprescribing of steroids and other drugs that cause massive fluid retention and therefore obesity and even morbid obesity. They damage the lives of scores of thousands of innocent sufferers in this country, and probably worldwide the total of victims would number millions.

If you are concerned about the health of your heart, it would be wise to cut down on the amount of salt that you eat. - See http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/conditions.html
Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

More about the bad effects of taking cholesterol-lowering statins.

Second opinion: These extraordinary drugs have the power to make a happy man very old

Extract:

""Since my husband, a previously alert and healthy man, started taking Atorvastatin, our lives have changed horrendously for the worse," writes a lady from Middlesex, echoed by others troubled variously by loss of memory, irritability, lethargy, personality change, melancholy, insomnia, excruciating muscle pains, numbness and burning of the hands and feet, bowel disturbances and much more.

There is no doubt that statins are to blame, as the improvement in in those who have "given them a rest" verges on the miraculous.

"I felt like an old man of 90 and had to use a walking stick," writes a formerly very fit ex-Marine from Dorset, who has since returned to his thrice-weekly workout in the gym.

If you are concerned about statins, see the website of Florida physician (and former Nasa astronaut) Duane Gravelin, www.spacedoc.net,) where he has posted the experience of several hundred statin victims."

If you are concerned about the health of your heart, it would be wise to cut down on the amount of salt that you eat. - See http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/conditions.html

Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

Is your cholesterol level high? Do you take statins?

If you want to feel younger, forget your statins - Sunday Telegraph article by Dr James LeFanu

Extract:

"A doctor accused of wittingly prescribing useless or possibly lethal drugs would vehemently - and understandably - deny it. This makes it rather difficult to oppose the prevailing medical consensus on statins - the cholesterol-lowering drugs prescribed to four million people in Britain at a cost of £1 billion a year.

That's quite a sum. It could pay the salaries of 700,000 nurses or build two spanking new teaching hospitals.

An even bigger sum is £15 billion. That is the profit the pharmaceutical industry made last year from this, the most profitable class of drugs ever invented. They are so profitable that the latest statins to reach the market came with a £600 million promotion budget, to "promote" the notion to family doctors and policymakers that the lower the cholesterol the better, and that at least half the population would benefit from the drugs.

But it is not so. Statins are useless for 95 per cent of those taking them, while exposing all to the hazard of serious side-effects. Hence my ever-growing file of letters from those who regrettably have had to find this out for themselves, illustrated by this all-too-typical tale from Roger Andrews of Hertfordshire, first prescribed statins after an operation for an aortic aneurism (that he had cleverly diagnosed himself)."

The drug-free way to reduce your cholesterol level (or to prevent ever developing problems with cholesterol) is to cut down on your salt/sodium intake, because you are much more likely to have cholesterol problems if you are sensitive to salt.

And remember, high cholesterol levels are often the result of taking prescribed steroids or HRT, because these drugs often cause salt sensitivity and obesity.

Remember - many prescribed medications do more harm than good.

Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)