Statin Side Effects Can Stop You from Exercising Read more: Statin Side Effects Can Stop You from Exercising Important: At Risk For A Heart Attack? Find Out Now.

Cholesterol-lowering statin drugs are credited with driving down the death rate from heart disease, but it is becoming increasingly obvious to many experts that they cause muscle problems that can deter people from exercising. This poses a major health dilemma because the people most likely to be prescribed statins – those at risk of heart disease – are also those who would benefit the most from exercise. Statins are now among the most prescribed drugs on the planet, and are taken by 20 million Americans. But doubts about widespread statin use are growing, especially in the wake of the Food and Drug Administration’s recent addition of safety alerts that warn of an increased risk of diabetes, memory loss, and muscle pain. SPECIAL: These 4 Things Happen Right Before a Heart Attack — Click Here for Info. The attention muscle pain is getting is long overdue, says Beatrice Golomb, M.D., associate professor of medicine at the University of California, San Diego. “At first, no one took these concerns seriously, but now, muscle pain and fatigue is clearly becoming a top concern,” she told Newsmax Health. And, although such muscle pain has traditionally been characterized as mild or inconsequential, her research shows this is not the case. “There is a huge spectrum in the degree of severity. Some people become essentially disabled. I’m talking about people who were previously healthy and can no longer get out of a chair or continue to do their work anymore,” Dr. Golomb said. On the other hand, she added, “Some people have mild symptoms that rapidly disappear when they discontinue the statins.” Paul D. Thompson, M.D., chief of cardiology at Hartford Hospital in Connecticut, is the lead author on a recent paper that found that rats treated with statins and then forced to run on treadmills to the point of exhaustion experienced cellular damage of the type that could make running harder and more damaging. But such reports are nothing new, he adds. “We first wrote about four (statin-taking) patients who were exercisers and had muscle damage in 1990, but we couldn’t get anybody to pay attention to it,” said Dr. Thompson, who is a running enthusiast. There are three types of muscle problems associated with statins. Myositis, which is an inflammation of the muscles; myalgias, which are muscle pains that are considered uncomfortable but harmless; and rhabdomyolysis, a severe muscle disease, which can lead to kidney failure and even death. Despite these risks, Dr. Thompson says: “I think statins are wonderful lifesaving drugs,” and he adds that he is not reluctant at all to prescribe them to his patients who have had heart attacks. But using them preventatively is less clear-cut. “There was a movement not long ago almost to put statins in the water, that’s how enthusiastic people were about them. But now we are saying, not so fast. There just aren’t a lot of people who have been on these drugs for 20 to 30 years, so we don’t know what all the effects are,” he said. After all, Dr. Thompson says, “We know that putting someone on statins for five years can make their arteries younger, but we also know it doesn’t do that for their muscles.”