I'm a 44 year old male. I was on Lipitor for four years and recen...

Read all Lipitor side effects

Posted at 9:16 AM on Jul 01, 2005 by jcitron, #9385

I'm a 44 year old male. I was on Lipitor for four years and recently started having severe cramps in my thighs and calf muscles, severe dirrhea, severe fatigue and bloody urine. I asked my doctor if it was the Lipitor, and he said it wasn't. Probably a virus he said because the Liver tests came back okay even though had some jaundice. Like a fool, I continued with the prescription and the cramps got worse in my legs and feet. I ended up stopping the Lipitor on my own in February 2005, nearly a year later, as the symptoms had not gone away, and I developed muscle twitches and tremors. My doctor then sent me for more blood work that showed my muscle enzyme levels were over 350% above my normal range, and a subsequent EMG/NC&VT showed the muscles had been weakend on my left side! He then had me discontinue the Lipitor and all statins indefinitely. As it turns out I am not the only one in my family with adverse reactions to statin drugs. My cousin and his father, both on my dad's side both have the same total cholesteral level I have at 268, and both are statin sensitve. My grandmother (same side) and her sister had very high cholesteral and both died from congestive heart failure at 87 and 92 respectively. I went from a fairly active person to someone who became really old fast. I now have to push myself out of a chair like my 93 year old uncle did. I am no longer taking any statin drugs and will control my cholesteral through diet and exercise. If I live to 92 like my great aunt did with no problems until she became that age, I should be so lucky. John

REPLY TO THIS POSTING | Private Message me | Add as friend | Flag as inappropriate

Reply 9 months ago on Feb 13, 2009 by cmosqueda760, #17056

I have always been the kind of person who did not go to the doctor. Yet recently I have found the need to go to the doctor, and found due to high cholesteral count, 249 the doc put me on lipitor. He didnt even tell me what he was doing or that I needed to change my life around. The way I found out was through his nurse.Anyway after three days on the drug, I experienced the very same issues as you have reported. I concluded it was the lipitor and stopped taking it. The problems immediately stopped. I am trying to handle the high cholester count on my own through diet but so far, I havent found out if my count has lowered any. I just wanted to say to you that your side effects are the lipito and dont let your doc terll you anything different.

Private Message me | Add as friend | Flag as inappropriate

Reply 9 months ago on Feb 14, 2009 by jcitron, #17070

I wonder that being borderline like this causes the problems from Lipitor and statins because our cholesterol isn't as high as required by this level of the medication.

Since I made the post above in 2005, my health has declined. I have been diagnosed with an atypical form of Parkinsonism with dystonia. I have tremors, stiffness, balance problems (fall backwards), and fatigue along with the severe muscles spasms or dystonia. I now take Sinemet 6-x per day along with Amantadine 3x, Lodosyn 3x, and Parcopa as needed. Without the medication, I walk around like I'm 98 years old all bent over and stiff and with severe mucle spasms in my feet and bicep muscles.

I blame all this on the statin drugs, but my neurologist doesn't think so. She thinks that the Lipitor didn;t help much, but it didn't cause what I have; it just brought the other symptoms out at the same time.

As a result of the PD symptoms, I an unable to fully enjoy the things that I used to in the past and this wasn't very much. I can no longer play the piano like i used to. This is something I did since I was around 7 years old. My hands have lost their speed and coordination, and on top of that my executive functions and cognitive skills have declined. What used to take me seconds to think about and act on, now take minutes and tens of minutes.

I still think that the Lipitor caused this, but of course the drs. won't admit it because they're afraid of lawsuits.

Private Message me | Add as friend | Flag as inappropriate