Fibromyalgia from statin use?

[pantaleon]

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone here has heard of (or experienced) fibromyalgia from statin use? I heard from a few friends that fibro can develop suddenly due to some kind of physical trauma - like having a bad reaction to a drug.

I took Zocor for 10 days last June and have been off of it for 6 months. I stopped taking it due to pain; to this day I am still experiencing a great deal of muscle pain in the neck, back, shoulders, and legs. Over time I've noticed the pain settle into the typical fibromyalgia tender points. It is intermittent - I have a few weeks with low pain levels, then something seems to set it off and the pain will come back full force for a couple weeks before settling back down.

Doctors can't agree on this--some are saying I have fibromyalgia, and some say fibro could not possibly develop that quickly (it happened literally overnight) or isn't likely in someone my age (I'm 22). All have come to the conclusion that my pain has nothing to do with statin use as I've been off it for half a year and the pain continues to cycle. I have no idea what to make of this; all I know is I was healthy before taking Zocor, and my life hasn't been the same since.

Does anyone have any insight to offer?

[JL]

Make copies of these articles and shove it in the faces of your doctors.
A recent study indicates that statins stimulates a gene in the body that destroys muscles. Since the heart is a muscle, I guess we know what that means. All the best to you.

*http://www.newswithviews.com/Richards/byron44.htm

*http://www.jci.org/cgi/content/full/117/12/3940

[Ray Holder]

Hi pantaleon
We have seen other cases on this forum of someone your age taking just a few statin tablets and being left with problems that have not gone away. Don't think that ceasing the tablets will cure the troubles on its own, I am much older, but my problems continued to worsen for 14 months after stopping the statin, before I found out about the necessary supplements.

Many others have obtained relief by taking Coenzyme Q10 and, especially for pains , L carnitine.

100mg three times a day is a good starting point for Q10 (in gelcaps) and 500mg Lcarnitine first thing in the morning, staying at that level for 3 or 4 days, and if that is not sufficient, add another 500 mg, wait 3/4 days, and add another 500, and so on, until you get relief or you find it doesn't work for you, but hopefully it will, as carnitine is needed to prevent painful lactic acidosis occurring in the muscles. Do not take a large dose straight away, your bowels will object!!

Ray

[Cat Mom2]

I finally learned that "SUDDEN", when you are on a statin means statin related. Every pain I had was sudden and came from out of nowehere without any prior history of that problem before and without injury of any sort. I still can not get over the day that the horriable knee pain hit both my knees at the same moment, I will always remember that day like it was yesterday. Just as suddenly as it hit, it went away when I got off of the statin, but not until after I had seffered for years with it.

[Dee]

Hi Pantaleon,

Here is a posting from me to the Fibromyalgia subject a while back. Thought you might benefit from the information so am posting the link to the thread below my previous comments.

"Fibromyalgia and statin damage are not the same thing. There is no known cause for Fibromyalgia.

I have had Fibro for 20 years, long before I ever took a statin. While Fibro is no picnic, I was able to function fairly normally with it until I developed statin damage 5 years ago. Now I am pretty much totally disabled.

Don't let doctors blow you off with a Fibromyalgia diagnosis. A more accurate assessment would be statin adverse effects with Fibro "like" symptoms.

I remember reading an article about a Rheumatologist that told the Cardiologists in his area to stop sending him patients that had been on statins, as there was nothing he could do for them.

The trouble with statins is that they cause so much body-wide damage that a person suffering adverse effects could probably be diagnosed with "something" wrong with many body systems, by many different specialists!"

http://www.spacedoc.net/board/viewtopic ... bromyalgia

[vipergg22]

[quote="Cat Mom2"]I finally learned that "SUDDEN", when you are on a statin means statin related. Every pain I had was sudden and came from out of nowehere without any prior history of that problem before and without injury of any sort. I still can not get over the day that the horriable knee pain hit both my knees at the same moment, I will always remember that day like it was yesterday. Just as suddenly as it hit, it went away when I got off of the statin, but not until after I had seffered for years with it.[/quote]


Oh yeah I used to go to bed and i was fine and wake up in the morning with my knees hurting so bad I had to almost crawl to the bathroom .

[ksxroads]

This has been so helpful to me, why I didn't join this forum earlier is beyond me! Thank you for being here. I too was diagnosed with fibromyalgia following statin useage... it was the memory problems I was most accutely aware of at the time... Bless you for all the information... Hazel