Don’t be fooled by new statin study
‘The danger of this nonsense is that doctors deceive themselves’
This paper’s sensible, independent-minded readers must, nonetheless, be very impressionable. At least, that would seem to be the obvious inference from the recent Lancet study from Professor Peter Sever of London’s Imperial College, claiming that patients have been misled by the adverse publicity surrounding the commonly prescribed drugs statins into believing they must be to blame for their debilitating symptoms of fatigue, muscular aches and pains, low mood and so on – the so called ‘nocebo’ effect.
How then does he account for those who make a miraculous recovery on discontinuing their medication, regaining their former mobility and sense of wellbeing – as described in considerable detail by thousands of readers in this column over the past decade?
The gist of the grounds for the professor’s patronising denial of these readers’ only too real experiences, as reported in this paper last week, is that, apparently, participants in clinical trials only report a higher prevalence of side effects compared with those taking a placebo when they know they have been taking the active drug – in this case, the cholesterollowering Atorvastatin. When they don’t know, the prevalence of reported side effects is the same. This cannot be so. All potent drugs will cause adverse effects in some of those taking them – even in drug company-sponsored clinical trials – so if their prevalence is reported as being no different from those taking a placebo, they are either not being correctly assessed or recorded.
The danger of this professorial nonsense is that doctors deceive themselves into supposing the drugs they prescribe are much safer than they really are, as I was recently forcibly reminded by the experience of a friend laid low by severe depression since undergoing bypass surgery five years ago.
His condition failed to respond to psychotherapy and a medley of different antidepressants until his cardiologist was eventually persuaded to discontinue the cocktail of drugs he was taking, including the beta blocker Bisoprolol.
When first introduced over 40 years ago, this class of drugs was reported as causing variously “a sense of hopelessness, tearfulness, decreased energy and insomnia”. Subsequent studies, similar to Prof Sever’s, have claimed on the contrary that there is “no significant increased risk” of such adverse psychological effects.
Within a fortnight, my friend emailed: “Without beta blockers, I am a different person.”
Painful nose
The conundrum of the gentleman whose pain on the bridge of his nose (“as if someone has hit it with a tennis racquet”) prevents him from wearing his reading glasses, it would appear, is almost certainly due to inflammation of the lining of the matchbox-sized, air-filled ethmoid sinuses between the eye sockets.
Hence, too, the associated symptoms of a runny nose and watery eyes from compression of the tear ducts. Inhaling the steam from a hot shower provides symptomatic relief, as does applying a warm compress on the face, though family doctor Duncan Wilson reports, from personal experience, a short course of antibiotics to be curative.
Benefits of hot air
Finally, further to the intriguing suggestion that the vibrations transmitted from the jaw joint to the ear canal when chewing gum prevents accumulation of wax, a reader wonders whether a similar mechanism might account for the marked improvement in his hearing since being given for Christmas an electric toothbrush with a highvibrational speed. Further reports would be most welcome.
Meanwhile, on a similar note, a blast of hot air from a hairdryer is commended as a soothing remedy for painful joints and tissues, as well as minimising the discomfort of insect bites and stings. Its drying function is particularly useful following a bath for those troubled with severe itching of sensitive areas such as the vulva – thus avoiding the irritation caused by rubbing down with a towel.