Making an Informed Decision

I posed the question the other day about the dilemma of mixed messages for consumers about medications to take or not take, a la Vioxx, Celebrex and aleve. How is a consumer to know what decision is the best for them to take given the official and unofficial results.

A quick web review found three interesting sites; the official Lipitor site sponsored by Pfizer which provides everything from official studies to a consumer oriented web portal where you can take an assessment test and get daily email reminders.

The counter view was provided by the statinalert.org who posited the idea that cholesterol is not a risk factor for heart disease and that statins are the biggest scam of the century (20th that is)

The third site was the consumer report view of the best value for medication and Liptior was named one the best buys although pure generics were even better. The web site even suggested increasing the dosage from 10-20-even 40 mgs which was one of my basic questions.

Now it could be said that I've not done enough research to make a "well informed decision" but given time and other constraint factors, I can say that I feel sufficiently satisfied to pursue this medical strategy for myself

How would you approach this issue