Pleiotropic effects of statins on cardiovascular events in the Japanese Coronary Artery Disease study

We analyzed 6317 patients with a baseline LDL-cholesterol level of 70 to 130 mg/dL among 13,812 patients of the Japanese Coronary Artery Disease (JCAD) study. We divided the patients into 2 groups according to statin treatment and its lipophilicity. We compared the incidence of all-cause events between 2000 statin-treated patients and 4317 patients without statins during a median follow-up period of 1092 days (range 0 to 1676 days). After propensity score matching (n = 1641, for each group), Kaplan–Meier analysis showed 25% reduction in the incidence of all-cause events with statin treatment (p = 0.0016). The incidence of all-cause events was also compared between 1139 patients with hydrophilic statin and 861 patients with lipophilic statin. After propensity score matching (n = 778, for each group), Kaplan–Meier analysis showed no significant difference in the incidence of all-cause events with respect to lipophilicity. Subgroup analysis of the JCAD study suggested a lipid-independent beneficial treatment effect of statins on all-cause events, and these favorable effects were comparable between the hydrophilic and lipophilic statins.