Long-Term Statin Therapy is Associated with Better Episodic Memory in Aged Familial Hypercholesterolemia Patients in Comparison with Population Controls
Affiliations: [a] Department of Internal Medicine, North Karelia Central Hospital, Joensuu, Finland | [b] National Institute for Health and Welfare, Helsinki, Finland | [c] Department of Medicine, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland | [d] Institute of Health, Sciences/Geriatrics, University of Oulu, Finland and Unit of General Practice, Oulu University Hospital, Oulu, Finland
Correspondence:
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Correspondence to: Laura Hyttinen, Department of Internal Medicine, North Karelia Central Hospital, Tikkamäentie 16, 80210 Joensuu, Finland. Tel.: +358 503838046; Fax: +358 131713046; E-mail: laura.hyttinen@pkssk.fi; Annamari Tuulio-Henriksson, National Institute for Health and Welfare, Mannerheimintie 166, 00300 Helsinki, Finland; Postal address: P.O. Box 30, FI-00271 Helsinki, Finland. Tel.: +358 206108548; E-mail: annamari.tuulio-henriksson@thl.fi.
Abstract: The cognitive status of aged familial hypercholesterolemia (FH) patients treated with long-term statin therapy was compared with that of population controls. A comprehensive cohort of 43 elderly (age ⩾ 65 years) patients all with the same FH North Karelia mutation living in North Karelia (eastern Finland) was identified, 37 of whom (aged 65 to 84 years) agreed to participate. All but one of these FH patients had been using statins for approximately 15 years. Population-based controls (aged 65 to 84 years, n= 309) were the participants of the Health 2000 Survey living in eastern Finland. The cognitive assessment was conducted with tests for verbal fluency, Word List Learning (WLL) and Word List Delayed Recall (WLDR) subtests in the Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer's disease test battery. After adjustment for age, gender, education, diabetes mellitus, and coronary heart disease, FH patients were more likely to be in the top tertile of the WLDR (Odds ratio (OR) 3.40, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.52–7.63) and WLL3 (OR 2.83, 95% CI 1.28–6.25) subtests. When the FH patients were subdivided according to the median length of their statin therapy, the ORs to be in the top tertile in the WLDR subtest were 1.65 (95% CI 0.52–5.25) for those with less and 5.40 (95% CI 1.74–17.72) in those individuals with more than median length of statin therapy. In conclusion, aged FH patients receiving long-term statin therapy exhibited better episodic memory than population controls, and this association became even more pronounced with longer statin therapy.
