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HealthDay News — The odds of surviving cardiac arrest appear higher for patients who’ve been taking statins, according to findings presented at the annual meeting of the American Heart Association, held from November 12 to 16 in New Orleans.
Ping-Hsun Yu, MD, a researcher from the National Taiwan University Hospital and College of Medicine in New Taipei City, and colleagues divided the medical records of almost 138,000 patients according to whether or not they had used statins for 90 days within the year before their cardiac arrest. The researchers also accounted for gender, age, other medical problems, number of hospitalizations, post-resuscitation factors, and other variables.
Those already using statins were about 19% more likely to survive to hospital admission and 47% more likely to be discharged. They were also found to be 50% more likely to be alive a year later. The greatest survival benefit from statins was seen in patients with type 2 diabetes, Yu’s team said.
“When considering statin use for patients with high cholesterol, the benefit of surviving sudden cardiac arrest should also be considered, as statin use before cardiac arrest might improve outcomes of those patients,” Yu told HealthDay.
