Julie Bove > wrote:

>Steve Pope wrote:

>> The risk that statins might cause diabetes is nowhere near
>> the risk that either beta-blockers or corticosteroids might cause
>> diabetes. I would be much more concerned about the later two
>> categories of meds.

>I am a diabetic. Not only did statins raise my blood sugar a lot and cause
>memory problems and locked up muscles but they caused me to have dry skin,
>badly peeling lips and hair loss. The hair is just now growing back but
>luckily the other problems resolved pretty much right away after stopping
>the meds.

>Do I blame the beta blocker I was taking prior to getting diabetes for
>giving me the diabetes? Probably. Given my family history I likely would
>have gotten it at some point. But I got it sooner than my brother and my
>dad.

So you had three risk factors -- family history, statins, and beta-blockers.
Hard to assign blame among those three.

One factor in favor of prescribing statins is there are not (at least,
widely agreed-upon) alternatives for statins as a first-line cholesterol
control med. Whereas beta-blockers, there are plenty of alternative
hypertension meds. (Some other conditions, other than hypertension, that
require beta-blockers there are probably no alternatives.)

Still, I firmly believe that cowboy medicine is largely responsible
for the diabetes epidemic. I have yet to see any evidence to the
contrary.


Steve