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Blog posted by: Andy Hutchinson and Jay Stone, 11 May 2018.

Andy Hutchinson from the medicines and prescribing team at NICE takes us through the pros and cons of statins.

Are they the right choice for everyone or would some of us be better off choosing not to pop the pills?

What are statins?

Statins are medicines that help to reduce the level of cholesterol in your blood.

Cholesterol is a fatty substance made by the liver. It can also be found in some foods. There are a two main types of cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein (HDL) and low density lipoprotein (LDL). We need both to function.

However, if someone has too much LDL cholesterol circulating in their blood, it can build up in the blood vessels called arteries. This can lead to disease of the arteries, which increases their risk of developing cardiovascular diseases (CVD) like coronary heart disease, angina,heart attack and stroke.

Statins reduce LDL cholesterol levels, which means they can help to reduce a person’s chance of developing CVD. They have been around for decades with more than 67 million prescriptions dispensed in England 2015-16.

But it’s important to remember that having high levels of LDL-cholesterol is just one risk factor that increases your chance of getting CVD.

Other risk factors include having high blood pressure, being overweight or obese, not being active enough, drinking too much alcohol and, most of all, smoking. The more risk factors you have, the more likely it is that you will get CVD.

But not everyone will get CVD, even if they have high levels of LDL-cholesterol and exhibit all the risk factors. It’s impossible to say for certain what will happen to someone.

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