Wednesday, August 5, 2020

Can a Statin Lower Risk for Ovarian Cancer?

                              
The connection between the use of statins and risk reduction for ovarian cancer has been the subject of research going back at least a decade (see https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2910322/ ). Most recently, Kala Visvanathan, M.D., MHS, professor of epidemiology ad oncology at Johns Hopkins, presented her findings at the American Association for Cancer Research (Virtual) Annual Meeting.

The study analyzed data from a Finnish national cancer registry along with prescription drug claims for over 10,000 women between 1995 and 2015. The researchers found that women with all subtypes of ovarian cancer had a lower mortality rate if they took statins. 

Although more research needs to be done, statins are very well tolerated and inexpensive and may prove to be part of the armament of treatment protocols at some point in the future.

To read more about this study, follow this link.