Cholesterol Reduction Drugs May Lead to Kidney Failure

Astrazeneca has begun to get ready for Crestor lawsuits in the wake of a new study being undertaken by the FDA, which is trying to assess the risks of taking Crestor and its link to muscle injury. Crestor lawsuits allege that Crestor is unsafe. The safety has not only been called into question in Crestor lawsuits. In fact, two major healthcare insurers with over 15 million patients have refused to reimburse for Crestor. While Astraceneca, the parent company of Crestor, did not release specific numbers regarding Crestor sales in the United States nor its profit numbers for the American market, those numbers are likely to fall somewhat as the emerging issues regarding Crestor side effects continues to grow.
Non-profit public interest group Public Citizen claims that Crestor side effects are severe enough to warrant a ban on the drug, and that the FDA should never have approved Crestor in the first place, since at least seven incidences of severe Crestor side effects were reported during the drug's trial phase. The rate of reported kidney problems is about 75 times higher with Crestor than with all other drugs in the same class combined, consumer group Public Citizen said. According to its analysis, there have been 6.4 reports of acute kidney failure or kidney damage for every 1 million Crestor prescriptions filled.
Crestor is the most potent statin on the market since its predecessor, Baycol, was voluntarily removed from shelves in 2001. Some Crestor side effects could prove crippling or even deadly - rhabdomyolysis occurs when a large number of skeletal muscle cells die, resulting in the release of a massive amount of muscle protein into the bloodstream. This leads to the deadliest of Crestor side effects, when the muscle protein becomes trapped in the kidneys, affecting the filtering process of the kidneys and leading to kidney failure. Related Crestor side effects include cardiac arrest resulting from potassium released from the damaged muscle cells, causing malignant heart rhythms. Astrazeneca has made no statement regarding these risks except for the standard warning that goes along with all statins. Potential plaintiffs who have any questions in regards to Crestor litigation and filing a lawsuit of their own should first speak to an experienced Crestor lawyer.