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Perioperative Risks Rise With Cessation of Statins


 

VIENNA — Stopping statins for a few days during and after major vascular surgery was linked with a significant rise in cardiovascular events at one center, according to a poster at the annual congress of the European Society of Cardiology.

The study included 298 consecutive patients on long-term statin treatment who underwent major vascular surgery at Erasmus. About a quarter of the patients stopped their treatment for an average of 3 days; the other 75% maintained treatment. Stopping a statin was associated with a 4.6-fold increased risk of troponin release, a marker of myocardial ischemia, and with a 7.5-fold increased risk of cardiovascular death or myocardial infarction, said Dr. Olaf Schouten, a vascular surgeon at Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

The analyses also showed that patients who stopped treatment with extended-release fluvastatin had significantly fewer events (see box).

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