Niacin and LDL

[koawala]

I am just starting to take niacin for a high level of LDL. I tried Policosinol(?) and Sytrinol but they did nothing for me. Now I am trying niacin. I don’t like the flush (who does- right?) and I am just on 100mg going on 200mg a day and trying to reach 1000mg a day. I have read in some articles that the no-flush niacin does not lower LDL so that is why I am taking the other type.

I would like to hear what other people have experienced with niacin to lower LDL. After you get used to niacin and don’t experience flushing do you ever have relapses where you flush? Is there an over the counter XR version of niacin? Do you use niacin with statens? Has niacin failed to lower your LDL? Has anything non-presciption worked for you?

I am in my mid-40s, don’t eat meat or dairy, have a family history of heart disease, I run,bike and exercise. What more could I do?

[Exapno_Mapcase]

I’ve been taking 500 mg of the no-flush niacin to lower triglycerides (not cholesterol) for several months. They have instead gone up.

I hadn’t read about no-flush niacin not working, so I googled it and sure enough this article comes up right on top:

Don’t Be Taken in by No-Flush Niacin

Even Niaspan, however, can cause flushing, and so people may be tempted to buy products advertised as “no-flush” niacin. These advertisers are correct: Their products do not cause flushing. What they fail to mention though is that their no-flush niacins don’t work. That is, they do not raise HDL cholesterol or lower LDL cholesterol or triglycerides.

He doesn’t give any sources, so I went to Medline and found this:

Varying cost and free nicotinic acid content in over-the-counter niacin preparations for dyslipidemia.

The average content of free nicotinic acid was 520.4 mg for immediate-release niacin, 502.6 mg for sustained-release niacin, and 0 for no-flush niacin. CONCLUSIONS: No-flush preparations of over-the-counter niacin contain no free nicotinic acid and should not be used to treat dyslipidemia.

Wow.

Thanks for getting me to investigate this. Guess I’ll try my luck with some regular niacin and see how bad the flushing gets.