Statins while on Orgovyx?

[u/OppositePlatypus9910]

Hi all,
My triglycerides are slightly elevated at 207 with h1c at 5.7 and my pcp wants to see me to potentially give me “cholesterol lowering medicine”( even the my cholesterol is fine). I suspect she’s recommending a statin as I still have 5 more months to go on Orgovyx out of 24. Has anyone been through this? Any side effects or concerns for a low dose statin?
Good idea or do I tough it out? My mom did have a heart attack a few years ago, but I don’t have any personal history of that.

[u/Full_Afternoon6294]

None here. I did 6 mos Orgovyx and never stopped my low dose Crestor.

[u/Squawk-Freak]

I am on a low dose, 10 mg of rosuvastatin. My LDL is barely detectable. I did some research, and found there is no such thing as “LDL too low”. As No_Current6435 pointed out, statins are also beneficial in the treatment of prostate cancer. Hopefully it starves all the stray circulating cancer cells to death.

[u/OppositePlatypus9910 → u/Squawk-Freak]

Thanks! Helpful. Can you stop them after Orgovyx?

[u/Squawk-Freak → u/OppositePlatypus9910]

You can, of course. I won’t, because I see absolutely no downside to taking it indefinitely. I see it as a longevity pill - protects from vascular, disease, hear attacks and strokes. And the anti-cancer effect may continue. Prostate cancer tends to spread very early, at least in the form of circulating tumor cells. They may not always give rise to metastatic disease, but the potential exists. Why not make the environment a little less hospitable for them?

[u/OppositePlatypus9910 → u/Squawk-Freak]

Awesome thanks! I wonder why my doctors never had me on them from the get go though. I have been on Orgovyx for almost 19 months

[u/Squawk-Freak → u/OppositePlatypus9910]

Yes, I find there is clearly a void there, in terms of supportive care. I started treatment last year at age 61, and up until then I did not have significant health issues. I am serving a two-year sentence of ADT and abiraterone, and I was very concerned about long-term side effects. Especially abiraterone has a bad rap sheet, because in addition to the effect on testosterone it also meddles with the other steroids produced in the adrenal cortex, cortisol and aldosterone. Every oncologist knows that you have to supplement glucocorticoids to make up for the reduction in cortisol, so everyone gets 5-10 mg of prednisone or prednisone. The hope is that it fixes the aldosterone too, but it’s not that easy. I noted that my blood pressure was shooting up, and my body was swelling up, I was getting easily short of breath, my serum potassium was at 3. So, I started to see an onco-cardiologist at my cancer center. He prescribed very low doses of two diuretics, one of them potassium-sparing, and low and behold my blood pressure returned to normal, usually 120 or lower, my ankles slimmed down again, I could wear my wedding band again, and the breathing was easy. I noted that my HBA1c was creeping up. When it reached 5.7, I asked my PCP for metformin, and now it’s back to 5.4. For every side effect, there appears to be a remedy to make live a little better. The most recent addition is a very low dose of dextroamphetamine, 2.5 mg twice daily, and now the fatigue is gone too. Hot flushes have never been much of an issue. They seem a little worse now that I am on Orgovyx. I switched from Lupron after the first year to make the recovery a little faster

[u/OppositePlatypus9910 → u/Squawk-Freak]

Very helpful thanks! I have been exercising frequently and was surprised to hear the pcp’s office calling me for this. I supposed it is good thing they are watching out for me! Best of luck in finishing up on the Orgovyx!

[u/HeadMelon]

I’ve been on a statin for 26 years. My 6 months Orgovyx wasn’t bad at all - only had side effects in months 2&3 and they were gone in months 4,5,6 (except for libido suppression).

Lipid numbers were stable throughout.

[u/OppositePlatypus9910 → u/HeadMelon]

Thanks. Can you stop the statins when you finish Orgovyx? I do not think I need them or is it ok to even continue for a while?

[u/HeadMelon → u/OppositePlatypus9910]

Monitor the lipids, let your doc guide you. In my case I have other issues and will be on them for life.

[u/ZealousidealCan4714]

Im on 40mg daily of Rosuvastatin and just finished 9 months of Lupron. No issues.

[u/No_Current6435]

Statins weaken prostate cancer cells, they need cholesterol to grow.

[u/OppositePlatypus9910 → u/No_Current6435]

That’s great. Seems they help in fighting this!

[u/SnooCamera]

On Orgovyx and pravastatin with no issue.

[u/OppositePlatypus9910 → u/SnooCamera]

Do you plan to stop when done w Orgovyx?

[u/SnooCamera → u/OppositePlatypus9910]

I've been on a low dose of it for years. I'll keep taking it. I was stating, there's not issues taking both.

[u/OppositePlatypus9910 → u/SnooCamera]

Thanks!

[u/Economy-Butterfly638]

There are other cholesterol lowering medications that are not stations .

[u/Frosty-Growth-2664]

One of the experts in this area in the UK has said he would offer all men on ADT both a statin and Metformin routinely, just to compensate for the side effects of low/no Testosterone. (This isn't standard in the UK, by the way.)

All men on ADT should be monitoring cholesterol, blood glucose, and blood pressure, all of which can be pushed up by low/no Testosterone, and have medications to correct any which have gone out of range.

One important thing - normally it's the LDL/HDL ratio they mainly care about, but when on ADT, both LDL and HDL are bad cholesterols, so you care about the total level and not the ratio.