Beginning statin treatment within 6 months after cancer diagnosis did not seem to improve 3-year cancer-related or overall survival, according to an observational study involving more than 17,000 individuals.

Participants averaged 76 years of age; were newly-diagnosed with colorectal, breast, prostate, or bladder cancer; and had not been prescribed statins in the 6 months prior to their diagnosis. Investigators compared mortality rates in patients prescribed statins within 6 months after diagnosis to those in whom statins were not initiated. They then compared their findings to those found in previous observational studies, and found that:

• The adjusted hazard ratio for cancer-specific mortality when comparing statin initiation to no initiation was 1.00.
• For overall mortality, the ratio was 1.07.
• The risk difference never exceeded 0.08%.
• Prior studies have noted an inverse link between statins and mortality, with a pooled hazard ratio of 0.70.

The authors noted that their results were not susceptible to selection bias from prevalent users or to immortal time bias.