Statin Therapy Also Cuts Inflammation

A combination statin therapy that lowers bad cholesterol can also reduce life-threatening inflammation linked to heart disease, say U.S. researchers.

Study leader Dr. Christie Ballantyne, cardiologist at the Methodist DeBakey Heart Center in Houston, says the study shows a 46-percent reduction in C-reactive protein, or CRP, a marker for inflammation, in patients treated with 40 mg of rosuvastatin and 10 mg ezetimibe — a statin therapy that has shown to lower bad cholesterol by 70 percent.

Inflammation can lead to serious complications such as heart attack and stroke, and high levels of CRP can predict these risks years before they actually occur, said Ballantyne.

Physicians have long relied on blood cholesterol as a key indicator of cardiovascular risk, but recent research suggests that high risk patients who achieved a low CRP level combined with a low LDL-c (bad cholesterol) level had the fewest cardiovascular events.

The study of 465 patients in five different countries found that after six weeks of the combination statin therapy 58 percent of patients achieved dual goals of lowering CRP and LDL-c.

The findings will be presented this week at the World Congress of Cardiology in Barcelona, Spain.