Statins may lower dementia risk in hypercholesterolemia patients, finds study

Written By : Medha Baranwal |Medically Reviewed By : Dr. Kamal Kant Kohli Published On 2020-07-27T17:25:26+05:30 | Updated On 27 July 2020 5:25 PM IST

Korea: Exposure to a statin in patients with hypercholesterolemia is associated with a lower risk of Alzheimer's disease and dementia, a recent study in the Journal of Internal Medicine has found.

The study by Jae‐woo Lee, Chungbuk National University Hospital, Cheongju, Korea, and colleagues was aimed to examine the association between statin exposure and dementia risk in hypercholesterolemia patients using data from the NHIS‐HEALS database between 2002 and 2015.

The patients were classified into two groups: statin exposure and statin non-exposure in accordance with medication possession ratio. Dementia was defined as those with primary diagnostic dementia codes such as F00‐F03, G30, G31.1, G31.9, or G31.82. The prospective association between statin exposure and dementia risk were investigated using Cox proportional hazards regression models.

The patients were followed for a median of 11.7 years. During the follow-up, 711 cases of dementia occurred, accounting for 11.5% of the total study population (statin exposure group, 8.2%; statin non-exposure group, 12.9%).

Key findings of the study include:

Compared to the statin nonexposure group, fully adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) for overall dementia in the statin exposure group were 0.63 and 0.62 in men and women, respectively.
Compared to the statin nonexposure group, the HRs for Alzheimer's disease and related dementia, vascular dementia and other types of dementia in the statin exposure group were 0.54, 2.45 and 0.59, respectively, in men and 0.53, 1.29 and 0.70, respectively, in women.

"Hypercholesterolaemic individuals exposed to statin had a lower risk of overall dementia and Alzheimer's disease and related dementia in both sexes, and a lower risk of other types of dementia in women, than subjects who were not exposed to statins," concluded the authors.

The study, "Statin exposure and the risk of dementia in individuals with hypercholesterolemia," is published in the Journal of Internal Medicine.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/joim.13134

Journal of Internal MedicinehypercholesterolemiadementiaStatin useLow density lipoprotein cholesterolStatins

Source : Journal of Internal Medicine

Medha Baranwal

MSc. Biotechnology

Medha Baranwal joined Medical Dialogues as an Editor in 2018 for Speciality Medical Dialogues. She covers several medical specialties including Cardiac Sciences, Dentistry, Diabetes and Endo, Diagnostics, ENT, Gastroenterology, Neurosciences, and Radiology. She has completed her Bachelors in Biomedical Sciences from DU and then pursued Masters in Biotechnology from Amity University. She has a working experience of 5 years in the field of medical research writing, scientific writing, content writing, and content management. She can be contacted at editorial@medicaldialogues.in. Contact no. 011-43720751

Dr. Kamal Kant Kohli

Dr Kamal Kant Kohli-MBBS, DTCD- a chest specialist with more than 30 years of practice and a flair for writing clinical articles, Dr Kamal Kant Kohli joined Medical Dialogues as a Chief Editor of Medical News. Besides writing articles, as an editor, he proofreads and verifies all the medical content published on Medical Dialogues including those coming from journals, studies,medical conferences,guidelines etc. Email: drkohli@medicaldialogues.in. Contact no. 011-43720751