Drug Therapy Benefits Outweighs Risk of Diabetes for High-Risk Patients
A study published in today's online issue of The Lancet finds that patients, who receive statin medications for controlling high cholesterol, have a slightly greater risk for developing diabetes. However, the study concludes that the potentially small possibility of developing diabetes is outweighed by the benefits gained by lowering the danger of serious heart disease events, such as a heart attack or stroke, in high-risk patients with a history of heart disease.
Dr. Antonio M. Gotto Jr., the Stephen and Suzanne Weiss Dean of Weill Cornell Medical College and a world-renowned authority in the field of cardiovascular medicine and statin drug therapies, co-authored the study, which examined data from over 90,000 patients for an average of four years. The findings show that statin therapy was associated with a 9-percent higher risk for diabetes.
"While we know that statin therapy continues to be important for those who are at high cardiovascular risk, the recent JUPITER study defined a new lower-risk population on the basis of C-reactive protein (CRP), age, and one other risk factor, despite an LDL-C of less than 130," explains Dr. Gotto. "This meta-analysis confirms a small increased risk of diabetes, as observed in JUPITER, but this risk is outweighed by the cardiovascular benefit."