Can Atorvastatin Make Tinnitus Worse?

My LDL cholesterol levels have been chronically high so my doctor changed my medication from Gemfibrozil to Atorvastatin 10 mg daily. I've heard of a LOT of issues w/ statins and tinnitus, and they all mention "of all the statins available in the US, only Atorvastatin is associated with tinnitus". Searching online, I found a military hospital study having 98 patients w/ hearing loss and tinnitus who were treated w/ Atorvastatin 40 mg daily for 8 months. The findings were: "Tinnitus, in patients having hyperlipidemia, can be successfully dealt with by treating hyperlipidemia with lipid lowering agent atorvastatin."

There are a lot of online posts from people that contradict that study. Some think that this drug either gave them tinnitus or increased the tinnitus they already had. The double-bind I'm is: high LDL cholesterol levels can cause tinnitus (along w/ potentially causing other serious health issues), but since I have tinnitus, taking a statin seems like a foolish idea.

Any thoughts or experiences on this?

 

Hi @momus. Have you done everything you can to improve diet and exercise to lower your cholesterol naturally? I know this is far easier said than done and some people just have high cholesterol no matter what they do, but it could be worth it trying even more. Maybe talk to a nutritionist because doctors don't usually have time to go into details. Statins are the easy answer.

I would also base the decision on exactly how high your LDL is, if you have a lot of HDL (good cholesterol) to balance out the LDL, and any other risk factors you might have like diabetes and high blood pressure.

Sorry you're having this dilemma. It's a tough one.

 

Oh yes, I changed my diet some time ago to one that is very healthy. Lots of things like garlic, ginger, etc that are anti-inflammatory, and nothing but fish or roasted chicken for meat. Plenty of greens, almost no saturated fat other than a little half and half in my coffee and a minimal amount of cheese. Minimal alcohol, and I get plenty of exercise for someone 71 years old.

It may be hereditary. My oxygen usually checks in a 98%-99% at the doctor, my weight is OK and BP is fine (w/ medication), but the LDL has been consistently high for years. It runs at 200, so it's twice what it should be. Because I have no heart symptoms (no shortness of breath, no chest pain from exercising, etc), she didn't think any sort of heart tests were needed.

Years ago I had a full stress test w/ a cardiologist who discovered I had a heart murmur. The doctor said not to worry about it, something else would probably kill me before that! We both laughed, and I think he was trying to tell me just to keep an eye on things and watch my diet, etc. But high LDL levels can mean a lot of things, and it can put added stress on our hearts and arteries.

My current doctor called me back today and suggested I try the Atorvastatin since it's only 10MG, and "see what happens". But she doesn't have tinnitus, and that may be a bad policy. It may go up and remain elevated, who knows? I'm still trying to make sense of the government health website that said that of all the statins, only this one was associated w/ tinnitus, but they failed to say whether it caused it, made it worse, or could make it better. Different studies have it working both ways, and a UK health website had some people who were convinced that this statin is what gave them their tinnitus.

 

I am pleased that you have started this thread @momus. My doctor advised me to take Atorvastatin as my cholesterol is a little raised. I had never had problems in the past with medications but I noticed my tinnitus increased and had other side effects. I stopped and restarted it a few times just to be sure it was the Atorvastatin making my tinnitus louder and it was. I went back to my GP and told him the problem and he prescribed an alternative Rosuvastatin. Although this didn't increase the tinnitus, it caused other side effects that I just couldn't cope with.

My doctor was very understanding and suggested Ezetimibe. Although not as good as Atorvastatin and Rosuvastatin, he advised that I give it a try. After 3 days my tinnitus reached excruciating levels that I hadn't experienced in years. I was really suffering with the ultra high pitched noise 24/7. I took Clonazepam which usually works to calm the tinnitus down but it had no effect! I decided not to return to my doctor. I have been cutting down on foods that are known to raise cholesterol and now take Benecol, a cholesterol lowering yogurt drink each morning.

After reading up on statin medications, I have learned they all seem to have side effects, the main one is increasing blood glucose levels and therefore, many people are prone to developing diabetes when taking these drugs. I take two different blood pressure medicines that are listed as, can cause ringing in the ears and yet, they don't affect my tinnitus.

Michael

 

After years and years of healthy living and the lowest body weight I ever had as an adult (152 lbs), I went on Atorvastatin. It was prescribed by a cardiac disease prevention specialist I had been seeing for five years. He told me diet and exercise can only get you so far. Some people just have a body that makes too much cholesterol. My numbers weren’t horrible, but enough to justify medication.

I was on a low 10 mg dose for 6-7 years before the tinnitus started. In my struggle to find a cause for the tinnitus I also explored Atorvastatin. I read some non-convincing articles with what I thought were questionable conclusions. I too found only articles where Atorvastatin was the tinnitus concern. I spoke with my doctor and he said he’s never had a patient on a statin draw causality between the tinnitus and the Atorvastatin.

Regardless, he honored my request to change medications. I’ve now taken 5 mg of Rosuvastatin daily for over four years. It’s had no effect on my tinnitus or anything else besides my cholesterol numbers. I’m a neurotic, paranoid person that’s terrified of anything that could potentially make tinnitus worse.

A few months ago I broke down and took antibiotics for the first time since tinnitus started. That only occurred because I got a cat bite and my hand swelled up like a balloon. I haven’t taken an OTC pain killer in almost five years, but I’m convinced this statin isn’t making things worse.

 

Thank you @spedgas and @Michael Leigh! Excellent information, and very much appreciated. This is pretty much where my head is at after spending 10 hours online researching this. Here's what I came up with:

Statins are crappy drugs, and more so for people w/ tinnitus. The list of possible/probable side effects from statins is long and worrisome. But high LDL cholesterol is bad news too. I fear increasing my tinnitus more than a heart attack or a stroke. Still, these are 2 lousy choices to have to make. From the three studies I found that were credible and had enough people to be valid, I found:

In studies that looked at both Atorvastatin and Rosuvastatin (two of which included people who already had tinnitus, as well as people over 70 years of age), all three showed a decrease in hearing thresholds at 6,000 Hz in some study participants. Enough participants had this happen for the studies to consider this a valid finding. Neither study mentioned if this was true for hearing thresholds above 6,000 Hz, but my assumption is they were negatively affected as well. That's the potential bad news. The good news is: the two studies that included people w/ existing tinnitus showed that Rosuvastatin at 10-20 mg dosages gave a significant decrease in tinnitus frequency, duration and severity in the study participants. Who knew?

Fortunately, @spedgas hasn't mentioned a decrease in hearing loss at the higher frequencies, so that's encouraging. That's a risk I'm willing to take in order to try the Rosuvastatin as long as I can closely and frequently monitor my hearing.

By the way, I consider that being a "neurotic, paranoid person that’s terrified of anything that could potentially make tinnitus worse" a healthy statement. We SHOULD be deathly afraid of taking anything that may make it worse. You sound totally normal to me.

 

@momus, it sounds like you're doing everything you possibly can lifestyle wise! I'm glad you got some input from people who have experience with Atorvastatin. I would agree if you're going to try a statin, try a different one.

This is somewhat unrelated but my uncle got permanent peripheral neuropathy in his legs from Atorvastatin and based on my mom's research, other statins are less likely to cause this negative effect as well.

 

@momus, I believe it's good to do a little research online and read up on studies but remember we are all different.

Atorvastain or other statin medicine might work for you without increasing your tinnitus. If they do increase the tinnitus, once you stop taking the meds, it should return to baseline level as mine has.

I suggest you discuss your health with your doctor as it's important to keep cholesterol under control. You might want to consider taking a cholesterol lowering drink as I have done and also monitoring your diet.

Best of luck,
Michael

 

I took Atorvastatin for almost 2 years. And I think it made my tinnitus worse. I was taking 40 mg and now I stopped. Do you guys think my tinnitus will go back to baseline since I stopped the drug? Or is it a long term damage?

 

I think I looked into an Atorvastatin link a year ago and didn't find one, so this is interesting.

After reading your post a while back, I stopped taking Atorvastatin for 3 days. I noticed no change in my tinnitus, so I started up again.

You mentioned stopping and restarting a few times. But how long did you have to stop to notice the change, and how long did you have to be back on it again to notice a change? I wonder if my 3 days of testing wasn't long enough. I figured it was a long shot but worth trying.

 

It is quite a while since I took Atorvastatin, so can't remember how many times I started and restarted it. As I have said in my previous posts, my GP prescribed three different types of statin medication and they all caused me problems. This is the first time I have had such a reaction to this type of medicine. My blood pressure meds are listed as can cause or make tinnitus worse. However, they haven't affected me in the slightest and my tinnitus can reach quite severe levels.

Each person will react to statins differently and some will people have no adverse effects. During my research on statin medication, I learned that most of them are prone to increase a person's blood glucose levels which means they are at risk of developing Type 2 diabetes.

At the moment I am taking Benecol daily. It is a cholesterol lowing drink, but there are other brands on the market. I have been watching my diet and taking regular exercise in an attempt to keep my cholesterol under control. My GP has recently contacted me as I am due a blood test, which will involve measuring my blood glucose and cholesterol levels.

Michael

 

Hello, that wasn't my question, though. It was:

Obviously anything can affect people differently. I've been on it for many years and have regular blood panels done, so I'm all good there and no side effects experienced on 20 mg. The possible tinnitus connection was something new for me to consider, and as mentioned, my 3 days test off the drug didn't make a difference. So, that's why I wondered if you saw results faster, even if you can't remember if it took 1 day or 3 days, etc.