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psychiatric medications cause high cholesterol
Drug Treatment: Even if you begin drug treatment to lower your cholesterol, you will need to continue your treatment with lifestyle changes. This will keep the dose of medicine as low as possible, and lower your risk in other ways as well. There are several types of drugs available for cholesterol lowering including statins, bile acid sequestrants, nicotinic acid, fibric acids, and cholesterol absorption inhibitors. Your doctor can help decide which type of drug is best for you. The statin drugs are very effective in lowering LDL levels and are safe for most people. Bile acid sequestrants also lower LDL and can be used alone or in combination with statin drugs. Nicotinic acid lowers LDL and triglycerides and raises HDL. Fibric acids lower LDL somewhat but are used mainly to treat high triglyceride and low HDL levels. Cholesterol absorption inhibitorrs lower LDL and can be used alone or in combination with statin drugs. Once your LDL goal has been reached, your doctor may prescribe treatment for high triglyc
Okay, now that you have accurate numbers, what do they mean? Before we discuss the numbers and their meanings, we need to clarify some terminology.
* Nicotinic acid (niacin)-This lowers total and LDL cholesterol and raises HDL cholesterol. It also can lower triglycerides. Because the dose needed for treatment is about 100 times more than the Recommended Daily Allowance for niacin and thus can potentially be toxic, the drug must be taken under a doctor's care.
The results were astounding to the medical community of that time. Normally, no one under 35 dies of coronary heart disease. Remember, this was 1951!
What are they and how do they work? Statins repress the enzyme HMG-CoA reductase. This enzyme controls the rate that cholesterol produces itself in the body. These drugs can lower cholesterol from 20 to 60%. They slow the production while they increase the liver’s ability to withdraw LDL. Statins lower the LDL levels better than any other type of drug.
For LDL, the desirable level is less than 130 milligrams/dl. The “borderline high” level is 130 to 159. the “high risk” level is 160 and above.
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