Statin treatment following coronary artery stenting and one-year survival

OBJECTIVES: We assessed the influence of statin therapy given after the procedure on one-year survival of patients treated with coronary artery stenting. BACKGROUND: Coronary artery stenting is currently a common treatment option for patients with symptomatic coronary artery disease (CAD). Although several secondary prevention trials have demonstrated improved survival achieved with statin therapy in conservatively treated patients with CAD, it is not known whether this benefit can also be expected in patients undergoing percutaneous coronary interventions with intraluminal stenting. METHODS: This study included 4,520 patients younger than 80 years who underwent coronary artery stenting and were discharged from the hospital in the period October 1995 through September 1999. We compared one-year mortality of 3,585 patients who received statins after stenting with that of 935 patients who did not. RESULTS: The mortality rate at one year was 2.6% among patients who received statins and 5.6% among those who did not. Thus, statin therapy at discharge was associated with an unadjusted odds ratio (OR) of 0.46 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.33 to 0.65), indicating a 54% reduction in the risk of death at one year. After adjusting for other covariates, the risk reduction associated with statin therapy was 49%, OR 0.51 (95% CI, 0.36 to 0.71). This reduction was observable in most of the subgroups of patients. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this nonrandomized study show that statin therapy improves survival after coronary artery stenting independent of patient characteristics recorded on the day of the intervention.