Dr. McDougall's Online Discussion Board

About 2 months ago I was diagnosed with high cholesterol and diabetes. I am 54, and I was 167 pounds and 5'9" tall. Cholesterol was 212 and sugar was 11.5. I was prescribed Metformin (500 mg twice a day) and a statin (40 mg once a day). As soon as I was diagnosed, I changed my diet and began eating a whole foods, plant-based, almost zero oil diet and exercising 30 minutes or more every day. I was a long time vegetarian, but not vegan and I had never exercised consistently though I was active in the garden. I have continued exercising every day and eating a WFPB diet and have not cheated. I was 149 pounds yesterday and nearly all my blood sugar checks are in the normal range and have been for about a month. My next cholesterol check will be done along with my sugar in about a month. The statin is causing constipation which I NEVER had before and I want to stop taking it as soon as possible. What needs to happen for me to safely stop taking the statin? What numbers do I need to have at my next test? What other "tests" do I need to pass in order to let the statin go? I am afraid that my doctors will want me to take it for the rest of my life. Thank you!

First of all congratulations on the great progress!
The best medicine is what you are doing with what you eat and how regularly you exercise.
It is a tough one . I don’t think any of us can advise you on the medications.
For statins you could try and get the calcium score and if it is zero, your doctor should be ok stopping the statin or lowering the dose a lot.
If calcium score is not zero, but your new cholesterol numbers are very low (ldl below 50 etc) you should be able to decrease the dose of the statin.
Since your sugar is now controlled with metformin , not sure if you can stop that. But get the new numbers and talk to your doc about reducing the dose.
Since you have had these bad numbers for sometime , it will take time to reverse the damage. So it might be best to continue taking the meds for some more time.

I have been following dr McDougall advice for more than 10 years to address heart issues . I am now on a very low dose of a statin . I stopped it for a while but was not feeling well so started taking it again .
Every case is different but rest assured you are doing the right thing by following de McDougall advice .

You could also try a different statin.
Lipitor worked better for me. I could not take crestor as it caused very bad side effects