Why do doctors prescribe lipitor

If your cholesterol level is high it should be checked more frequently — at least annually. And if you have a family history of high cholesterol, it should be monitored several times a year. Your doctor will conduct a risk assessment to determine if you need to take a cholesterol medication. If you have additional risk factors like diabetes, high blood pressure, a smoker or family history of heart disease or high cholesterol, they will usually recommend you take medication to control your cholesterol.

Statins are generally considered the first-line treatment for high cholesterol. There are a number of these medications available including Lipitor atorvastatin , Crestor rosuvastatin , Zocor simvastatin and Pravachol pravastatin. Generally speaking statins are safe and well tolerated by your body with minimal or temporary side effects such as headache, nausea, drowsiness, flushing of the skin or difficulty sleeping at times.

Some of the more serious side effects that have been reported are muscle aches and pain. Mild muscle soreness, tiredness or weakness might be a minor discomfort in most cases but can be severe enough to make daily activities difficult in a few individuals. Very rare serious side effects may include muscle damage rhabdomyolysis , liver or kidney failure but the risks are very low with incidence being calculated as only a few cases per million statin users.

The AHA issued a statement this week that based on an analysis of decades of clinical studies involving different statins, side effects are very rare and the benefits of them greatly outweigh the risks.

Treatment needs to be individualized for you based on your risk factors. You and I include myself need to understand the risks of not taking a statin vs. Of the 2, doctors in the Medicare prescribing database, almost 37 percent received industry payments. Those who did take money prescribed brand-name drugs at a rate of almost 23 percent. The most common form of payment was for company-sponsored meals, but payments for educational training translated to an almost 5 percent increase in brand-name prescriptions.

The study authors did note limitations to their study, including accuracy of the reporting of payments and prescriptions covered outside of Medicare. They do suggest, however, drug companies may seek out doctors because they already prescribe their drugs.

The most commonly prescribed branded statins were Lipitor and Crestor, the study showed. While not a cause-and-effect smoking gun, the study, published Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine , echoes findings from a ProPublica investigation published in March that connects industry money to an increased likelihood a doctor will prescribe more expense brand-name drugs.

In the fields of cardiology, psychiatry, ophthalmology, family, and internal medicine, between 70 and 90 percent of doctors reported taking payments. Generic drugs account for 88 percent of all prescriptions filled in the United States. Generic drugs for hypertension and cholesterol alone saved the U. Besides providing savings to the most expensive healthcare system in the world, the drugs are less expensive for patients.

A study found, when compared to brand-name statins, Medicare patients taking generics were more likely to adhere to their treatment and had fewer adverse health outcomes as a result. It should be noted that Teva Pharmaceuticals, which manufactures generic statins, funded that study.

While the generics are equally effective, these newer, updated formulations can remain under patent and help retain company profits. Joshua M. Exercising and eating foods rich in fiber can help. But for some patients, even that is unlikely to be enough. For those unlucky folks who naturally produce a lot of cholesterol, doctors recommend drugs like Lipitor atorvastatin , a type of drug called a statin that is used to lower cholesterol.

Recently, the CDC assessed the percentage of Americans taking statins. See figure. Is it really necessary for that many Americans to be taking these drugs? It's possible that we aren't. Prevention, after all, is the best medicine. So if statins are saving thousands or millions of lives, perhaps it's worth it. But there is something of a public war going on over the use of statins.