Do statins help keep hearts healthy in people with type 2 diabetes?
Optimizing statin therapy for primary prevention of cardiovascular disease in type 2 diabetes mellitus patients: Exploring dose, class, and intensity
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a healthcare professional. Terms
Surprising Findings
Pitavastatin was associated with a 95% reduction in CVD risk — nearly double the protection of other strong statins.
Pitavastatin is rarely prescribed in the US or Europe, despite this massive observed benefit. Most guidelines treat statins as broadly equivalent for risk reduction, but this data suggests otherwise.
Practical Takeaways
If you have type 2 diabetes, talk to your doctor about whether you're on a high-intensity statin and if your dose could be optimized.
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a healthcare professional. Terms
Surprising Findings
Pitavastatin was associated with a 95% reduction in CVD risk — nearly double the protection of other strong statins.
Pitavastatin is rarely prescribed in the US or Europe, despite this massive observed benefit. Most guidelines treat statins as broadly equivalent for risk reduction, but this data suggests otherwise.
Practical Takeaways
If you have type 2 diabetes, talk to your doctor about whether you're on a high-intensity statin and if your dose could be optimized.
Publication
Journal
Diabetes & Vascular Disease Research
Year
2023
Authors
Jun Yu, Wanqing Chen, B. Shia, Szu-Yuan Wu
Related Content
Claims (5)
Taking statins might slightly raise your chances of getting type 2 diabetes, but they do a much better job of preventing heart attacks and strokes — especially if you're already at high risk.
If you have type 2 diabetes, taking more statins over time seems to lower your chances of heart problems a lot — especially if you're in the group with the highest exposure, who saw their risk drop by nearly three-quarters.
For adults with type 2 diabetes, taking statins is linked to a much lower chance of getting heart disease — about 61% less — based on a big study that followed hundreds of thousands of people for nearly a decade.
For adults with type 2 diabetes, taking stronger daily doses of statins might lower their chances of heart problems, with the highest doses seeming to offer the most protection.
For people with type 2 diabetes, some cholesterol-lowering drugs (statins) seem to protect the heart better than others, with pitavastatin showing the strongest benefit in studies, followed by rosuvastatin, pravastatin, and others in a clear order.