A quarter of patients eligible for statins aren’t on the medication

One in four people eligible for statins is not taking the medication, according to a new study. Looking at nearly 5,700 statin-eligible patients in a lipid management registry, researchers found that more than 1,500 people were not on the medication. Of these, 60 percent were not on statins because they were never offered the treatment, 10 percent of them declined the medication, and the other 30 percent stopped taking the drugs. Some 40 percent of those who declined therapy or discontinued treatment thought statins were safe — in contrast, 70 percent of current statin users said they thought the medicines were safe. A caveat: Patients were asked to self-report whether they were previously offered statins, making some of the data in the study subject to recall bias.