A "Fire-and-forget" Rebellion
Why Your Patients Are Quiet Quitting Statin Rx
A patient from a year ago reconnected with me yesterday. He was frustrated and confused.
His situation is increasingly common in cardiology and primary care. Mid-sixties man with non-obstructive coronary artery disease, with a 50/50 split between calcified and non-calcified plaques on CT angiography. Elevated lipid and inflammation markers, including vascular specific and endothelial dysfunction parameters. He is asymptomatic. He opted out of working with us in 2024. A year later, he still had the same questions, and the same laboratory values. A handwritten scribble on his lab results print out read “LDL less than 100 is good”.
In 2024, he came to us seeking alternatives to statin therapies. His goal was to “reverse high cholesterol naturally.” This ask is so common at the Holistic Heart Centers that we offer a program called Statin Overprescribing Solution to many patients. In fact, my podcast episode on statin overprescribing was the most popular of 2025.
I have received numerous inquiries from physicians as well, with requests to land an integrative cardiology viewpoint to their patient cases. This morphed into our educational platform, Holistic Heart University, with several courses focusing on lipids and metabolism, and a dedicated case review space.
As you could have guessed, his cardiologist already prescribed a high-intensity statin which this patient had no intentions of taking. He, and many patients like him, are quiet quitting their physician recommendations and ditching statin prescriptions, despite seemingly understanding the gravity of their vascular risk. I say “seemingly” because a traditional concept of vascular risk is vague and impersonal, reduced to population-based statistical probabilities, and bearing little to no relationship to patients’ top of mind concerns. Patients are increasingly demanding a personalized solution, seeking alternatives to one-size-fits all treatments.
So I want to let you in on a little secret, completely counterintuitive to what you may be thinking, to help your patients turn their statin rebellion into an opportunity for health optimization.
