BMJ 1996;313:1142 (2 November)

Letters

Study greatly underestimates the cost effectiveness of statin treatment

EDITOR,--The analysis of P D P Pharoah and W Hollingworth of the cost effectiveness of lowering cholesterol concentration is flawed.1

With respect to secondary prevention, the authors do not take account of the significant reductions in the incidence of strokes and transient ischaemic attacks, chronic heart failure, and unstable angina requiring admission with simvastatin in the Scandinavian simvastatin survival study.2 Although strokes and transient ischaemic attacks and chronic heart failure are comparatively infrequent events, they are expensive. In the placebo group, for example, stroke accounted for 1280 days in hospital compared with 4473 for acute myocardial infarction. Admission for angina is both common and expensive. In the Scandinavian study the number of hospital admissions for angina (401 in the placebo group) was second only to that for acute myocardial infarction (630 in the placebo group). The number of days spent in bed by patients with unstable angina was 1585.

With . . . [Full text of this article]


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Relevant Article

Cost effectiveness of lowering cholesterol concentration with statins in patients with and without pre-existing coronary heart disease: life table method applied to health authority population
P D P Pharoah and W Hollingworth
BMJ 1996 312: 1443-1448. [Abstract] [Full Text]

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