Do it yourself

My mum's myasthenia gravis has seemed to be getting worse. Her 'good' eye was permanently closed, leaving her with just the eye that has been quite badly affected by wet macular degeneration. It's been difficult for all of us.

Shortly after being discharged from hospital in October with a diagnosis of myasthenia gravis, she saw the pharmacist at the GP surgery to go through all her meds. 'No problems' he declared, and seemed more interested in getting my mum to go out walking... she's 86, and in addition to the myasthenia gravis, she has COPD and can't see properly.

The fact that her myasthenia meds didn't seem to be having any effect on her closed eye was driving me mad, so late on Friday night, unable to sleep, I started searching. I read medical papers and then started to re-read the drug information leaflets of everything she's been prescribed since August,  which includes the things prescribed before the myasthenia was diagnosed...

And there we have it... the statins ( prescribed in hospital in August) can make myasthenia worse. I rang my mum on Saturday and told her to stop taking them. At the moment she has little quality of life, unable to even read or watch TV ( she was an avid reader and enjoyed the TV too). I explained that statins may help to prevent a stroke or heart attack along the line, but could well be making the myasthenia worse. Her response was ' Why would I be bothered about preventing a stroke or heart attack at my age?' She was quite happy to stop taking them to test whether they are worsening the myasthenia.

I visited yesterday, and her eye was partly open for the first time since early December...