Intended for healthcare professionals

Rapid response to:

Practice Practical prescribing

Statins

BMJ 2024; 384 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj-2022-072584 (Published 24 January 2024) Cite this as: BMJ 2024;384:e072584

Rapid Response:

Re: Statins

Dear Editor

I note with some concern the new suggestion to consider initiating statin treatment at >1%, and that this risk is considered moderate in this article. The average risk of a 50 year old man as assessed on QRISK3 is 3.6%. And and that of a 60 year old man is 7%. This would make life long statins standard for even those under 50.
In fact average QRISK3 10 year risk reaches 1.1% for men at the grand old age of 40. And that is for a non-smoker of normal weight.
Do we really want to even consider treating most of the population life long from this age?

Competing interests: No competing interests

04 February 2024
Ben Bradley
GP
Beit Shemesh, Israel