The raison d'etre of this website is to provide you with hard scientific information which may help you make informed decisions in your quest for health (so far I have blogged concise summaries of over 1,500 scientific studies and have had three books published).

My research is mainly focused on the effects of cholesterol, saturated fat and statin drugs on health. If you know anyone who is worried about their cholesterol levels and heart disease, or has been told to take statin drugs you could send them a link to this website, and to my statin or cholesterol or heart disease books.

David Evans

Independent Health Researcher

Sunday 7 June 2015

Statin use associated with 87% increased risk of diabetes

This study was published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine 2015 Apr 28

Study title and authors:
Statins and New-Onset Diabetes Mellitus and Diabetic Complications: A Retrospective Cohort Study of US Healthy Adults.
Mansi I, Frei CR, Wang CP, Mortensen EM
Department of Medicine, VA North Texas Health System, 4500 S. Lancaster Rd #111E, Dallas, TX, USA, Ishak.mansi@va.gov.

This study can be accessed at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25917657

The objective of the study was to examine the association between statin use and new-onset diabetes, diabetic complications, and overweight/obesity in healthy adults. The study lasted 8.5 years and included 3,351 statins users who were matched with 3,351 nonusers.

The study found:
(a) Statin users had a 87% increased risk of developing new-onset diabetes compared to nonusers.
(b) Statin users had a 150% increased risk of developing diabetes with complications compared to nonusers.
(c) Statin users were 14% more likely to be overweight or obese compared to nonusers.

Mansi concluded: "Diabetes, diabetic complications, and overweight/obesity were more commonly diagnosed among statin-users than similar nonusers in a healthy cohort of adults. This study demonstrates that short-term clinical trials might not fully describe the risk/benefit of long-term statin use".