We've got lots of people taking statin drugs these days. Arguably one of the most frequently prescribed classes of medications out there. I know they're right up there with acid blockers. You've got statin drugs, like it's millions of doses or millions of prescriptions every year without a doubt, at least here in the us. So one of the things you need to understand is that sometimes the statin drugs you're taking are just draining your energy and you take 'em, you're on 'em for a while, everything's fine, and then you just start getting more lethargic. You're crashing in the afternoon, you're not making energy like you normally do. Eating doesn't fix it. It's not low blood sugar. It just doesn't seem to make much sense. Sometimes it's because of your statin drug. Now, that doesn't mean you have to go stop your statin drug. That's not what I'm trying to say.
(00:59)
But one of the things that statin drugs do is they drain your energy, but they do it for a specific reason. They block the production of cholesterol. That's how they do their job. But that same level of blockage also blocks your production of something that you really need, something that's important for your heart and for your mitochondria, for your brain, for your eyes, and that's something called coq 10. So most of us have probably heard of coq 10, and for the most part in the prescribing information for your statin drug, it will tell your prescribing doctor that you should be taking coq 10 with that. Because if it's a class of medications called an HMG coa reductase inhibitor, okay, HMG COA reductase inhibitor. So if it's one of those, when they block the production at that HMG COA step, that's what also blocks the production to coq 10.
(02:00)
Now, when you start to have some mitochondrial damage and you don't have the coq 10 to repair it and help 'em work the way they're supposed to, you start running into some troubles. So statins can complete or deplete your coq 10, and that means that your muscles, your heart, your mitochondria in many cases don't have the ability to produce energy and do the other things the mitochondria do. There are a couple of forms of coq 10. Originally it was coq 10, then you could take ubiquinone. Now there's ubiquinol, which is more absorbable. That's the form we tend to use here at the office, one to 200 milligrams a day is usually what it takes when someone's on a statin drug. But if you're taking a statin, the coq 10 really isn't optional. If you take the attitude of, well, if I get side effects, then I'll try the coq 10.
(02:54)
It's not a matter of whether or not the statin drug is going to block your production of coq 10. It will block your production of coq 10, and that will do damage and that will affect you. Will it affect you in a way that you recognize? Maybe, maybe not. But if you wait to get symptoms to start taking the coq 10, you are likely going to wait too long. So I normally tell my patients, if you go on a statin drug, you should just go on coq 10 with it. That's part of the cost of doing business there, and you're going to take it the entire time you're taking the statin drug. If at some point you get off your statin drug, I would continue taking the coq 10 for probably up to a month or six weeks afterwards to give your time body time to ramp up its own natural production of coq 10 again.
(03:40)
Then you can get off of it if you want to and go on about your business. But it's not something I would wait for. It's not something I think is optional. When you go on a statin drug, you should be taking a version of coq 10. So what does it do? Why do we need coq 10? It's a vitamin like compound in our body. It's not a hormone. It's like a vitamin. It's found in almost all cells because that's where mitochondria are found. Some cells have gobs of mitochondria. Some cells only have one or two. So like the brain, the eyes, the heart, that's where the majority of mitochondrial density occurs. Now, obviously in the muscle cells, you're going to have quite a few mitochondria, and then in cells that don't do a whole lot, you're going to have fewer mitochondria. So heart, brain, liver, muscles, eyes. Those are the places where you're going to see a lot of what we call mitochondrial density.
(04:35)
There's something called the electron transport chain that takes electrons in and out of the mitochondria, and that's partly how it provides something called a TP for you, a dentist and tri phosphate, that's your kind of your gasoline. So think of the mitochondria like the refineries, and think of having a refinery in every cell. I'm going to oversimplify it here. So crude oil comes into the cell kind of in the form of fats and carbohydrates, and then you have this little refinery that turns it into a TP, which is the gasoline for our cells. And then the cells can do their job, which means the organs and tissues can do their job, and then your body can do its job, but that's what the mitochondria are there for and that's why you need the coq 10 in there. Coq 10 can also act as a pretty stout antioxidant.
(05:28)
So protecting the cells from damage, and it stabilizes the cell membranes. So that, what can I say? So think of having a fence around your yard. You don't want a floppy fence that's fallen down all the time if it's going to do its job and keep your pets and kids in and keep all the riffraff out. You need a strong fence that has gates that work and they latch when you want 'em to, and they open when you want 'em to. That's how you want your cell membranes to be. And coq 10 can help stabilize your cell membranes, like building a really good quality fence. And then they regenerate vitamin E. Vitamin E is another important fat soluble antioxidant, and they help you when you use vitamin E, they help you put it back together again so you can use it at another times. So they keep your vitamin E recycled and efficient and ready to be used.
(06:19)
So statins, we already said they block the HMG COA reductase enzyme. That's how it reduces cholesterol also reduces coq 10. It can reduce your coq 10 levels for some people up to 30 to 50% of what you should be making. Now, some people already are low in coq 10, and so you take that person, put 'em on a statin drug, drop their coq 10 by an average of let's say 40%, and you're really looking at having some issues. Other people really robust, good coq 10 levels. You drop that by 30 or 40%. Maybe they feel it, maybe they don't, but it is affecting the function of those mitochondria. Symptoms can include fatigue, which is what we started with. Muscle pain. One of the most common side effects of statin drugs weakness, they call that statin associated myopathy, a decline in mitochondrial function that you wouldn't necessarily notice.
(07:16)
But if you're doing organic acid testing in our office, there are some organic acid tests. They call 'em oats organic acid test, or there's one called a neutro valve, which does organic acids plus several toxicity markers. You would see the lack of mitochondrial function on a test like that, and because this is going to sound ironic, I suppose, but because mitochondria are so dense in the heart tissue, if you lack mitochondrial function and you lack coq 10, you can be worsening the heart condition in someone who's taking a statin drug to try to better their situation cardiovascularly. So you can actually be working against yourself in that sense. So if you supplement with something like ubiquinol, it replenishes the mitochondrial warehouse where it keeps all that coq 10 available to do its job. It kind of fills up the shelf so that when you're mitochondria need it, they can just grab it and use it like they're supposed to.
(08:27)
Because of that, it can increase muscle strength. It can decrease muscle pain, which we would call myalgia. It supports cardiac output. It can increase your ejection fraction, which is when your heart pumps, how much blood does it move? If it could move a given amount of blood, the ejection fraction is what percentage of that total amount is it actually moving? So if it can move, I'm going to throw out random numbers, but if it could move eight ounces of blood and every time it pumps, it's only moving four ounces of blood, you're only doing half of what you're capable of. So it raises that ejection fraction. It makes the heart work more efficiently. That's great. In cases of congestive heart failure, it enhances energy and stamina, obviously, and it can help with brain fog and brain function because you also have a lot of mitochondria there.
(09:23)
And then it reduces oxidative stress, and it's good for vascular health because of its antioxidant properties. So ubiquinone, an oxidized form of coq 10, it has to be converted into ubiquinol in the body because that's a form our body uses. But in many cases, people can do that fairly well. It's more affordable usually than ubiquinol, but it's not as bioavailable. It's not as easily absorbed and used, especially in patients that may lack the ability to do those conversions. So patients that are either elderly or chronically ill may not be as capable of making those conversions. So ubiquinol is kind of the preferred form. It's active and ready to use by the mitochondria as it goes in. They say it's like six or eight times more bioavailable than ubiquinone, and then it's better suited, obviously, for those in the elderly populations or those who are chronically ill and may have trouble activating other forms of coq 10.
(10:27)
So for people over 40 or with chronic health issues, ubiquinol is definitely what you would prefer. Doses normally run one or 200 milligrams a day. There are some times where doctors will use three, four, or 500 milligrams a day for migraine sufferers and things like that. But for general use, with a statin drug, one to 200 milligrams a day, especially if you're taking ubiquinol, you don't need those real high doses because it's so well absorbed. Some people say you need to take it with a meal that contains fat to help you absorb it better probably, but you're going to absorb a fair amount of it even if you don't. Very few side effects. Every once in a while someone gets a little GI upset. I've had a few patients be like, if they take an evening dose, they feel almost, I don't want to say ramped up. It's not a caffeine like energy, but their brain starts working. They feel kind of dialed in, like they could be productive and they're trying to go to sleep. It doesn't happen all that often, but that is one of the side effects that we see from time to time.
(11:36)
I would say one of the important things to remember is take it early, not early in the day. Take it early in the process. When they give you a statin drug, just go ahead and start taking coq 10 right along with it. You can call our office. You can call your other functional medicine doctor's office. You can get ubiquinol online other places, but just make sure that you're taking some of it. And then even outside of taking statin drugs, if you have a lot of muscle pain, if you have fatigue, if you have congestive heart failure, if you have fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, things like that, I would consider taking some coq 10 because it's so important for those tissues, and I guess we would naturally get it maybe in liver, maybe if you're eating heart or if you're taking organ capsules that have liver or heart, you would probably get some coq 10 in there.
(12:24)
But otherwise, we're not going to run into it much in our diet. And then some people will take magnesium with it. That's another one that sometimes is necessary when you're taking statin drugs, alpha lipoic acid, B vitamins, those are all important for mitochondrial function. So those would be good adjuncts to take along with it. So don't take your statin drugs without coq 10 and figure, well, as long as I feel okay, everything's fine. I would really caution against that. Just start 'em early. Take 'em while you're taking the statin drug. Whether or not you need to be on the statin drug is a whole different video. But if you're going to be on a statin drug and some people do need it, then I would definitely be taking coq 10 along with it. Alright, if you have any questions, let me know. Otherwise, thanks for watching. See you next time.
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