I've often discussed the many good things that statins seem to do. A paper presented at the recent American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology Meeting adds a new benefit to the list. The senior author was Dr Zelefsky from the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York. His team studied 871 men with stage T1 to T3 prostate cancer treated with radiotherapy. As many as 19% (168) were taking a statin drug at the time of diagnosis and treatment; none of them discontinued the statin, which was being taken to control LDL-cholesterol levels.

Five and ten-year survival rates were as follows: with statin, 91% and 76%; without statin, 81% and 66%, respectively. The differences between with-statin and no-statin were significant. Further, there was a trend towards a lower number of metastases in the men taking statins.

This is an interesting and provocative finding. It may be that statins act as a radio-desensitizer. However, other participants at the meeting said they did not regard the findings as sufficiently strong to encourage men to take statins unless there was another good medical reason.