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    The Statin Controversy: and how we resolve it
    The Statin Controversy: and how we resolve it
    The Statin Controversy: and how we resolve it
    Ebook133 pages1 hour

    The Statin Controversy: and how we resolve it

    By Geoffrey Galley

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    About this ebook

    "For more than two decades a controversy has raged between the pharmaceutical companies, the health services and independent doctors and scientists over the use of statin drugs. It affects the health of millions of members of the public who are increasingly confused by conflicting arguments over the safety and efficacy of the drugs which are already prescribed for over 7 million people in the UK alone.
    Geoffrey Galley, the author of this book, has stepped into the middle of this seemingly unresolvable dispute and provided us with a remarkable solution which should be equally attractive to those on both sides of the argument. Instead of accepting what would be an unmanageable adjudication of the vast body of scientific and technical information underpinning the case made by each side, he proposes an independent retrospective review of the state of health and level of survival of a significant number of individuals who have been treated with statins over a period of between ten and twenty years as compared with individuals with the same initial risk factors as the statin takers who have not received statin treatment.”
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMelrose Books
    Release dateJun 7, 2018
    ISBN9781912333707
    The Statin Controversy: and how we resolve it

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      Book preview

      The Statin Controversy - Geoffrey Galley

      PART 1

      Chapter 1

      The Statin Controversy

      DETAILS OF THE DISPUTE BETWEEN THOSE WHO SUPPORT THE USE OF STATINS AND THEIR CRITICS

      If you are taking statins or if you are being advised to take them by your doctor, you may be aware that a serious controversy has arisen over the use of these drugs. You may, for example, have noticed headlines in newspapers which carry conflicting reports about the claimed efficacy and safety of statin treatment as a means of reducing your chance of having a fatal or non-fatal heart attack or stroke or of needing a surgical procedure such as a coronary bypass operation or a stent implantation to improve blood flow in the arteries of your heart. These events are collectively referred to as a major vascular event abbreviated herein to the term mve. More importantly, you will have seen widely divergent claims about the number and severity of side effects suffered by those who take statins. As an example of this controversy the Daily Telegraph newspaper of 1 August 2017 carried the headline ‘Statins needlessly doled out to millions simply because of their age’ while on the same day The Times carried the headline ‘Give statins to almost all men over 60, GPs are told’. Nor is the argument confined to the newspapers. In September 2016 The Lancet medical journal published a meta-analysis which is referred to herein as the Lancet study.(1) It was overseen by the Clinical Trial Service Unit (CTSU) based in Oxford and claimed that statins save many individuals from mves and that around one in 100 users suffer from non-serious side effects which are quickly and easily dealt with. One week later the British Medical Journal (BMJ) carried an editorial suggesting that the Lancet study was far from realistic. In the editorial,(2) the Editor in Chief, Fiona Godlee stated:

      Independent third party scrutiny of the statins trial data remains an essential next step if this increasingly bitter and unproductive dispute is to be resolved. I have now written to England’s Chief Medical Officer, Sally Davies, asking her to call for and fund an independent review of the evidence on

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