Statins and the Aging Brain

Robert W. Griffith, MD

The brains of people with Alzheimer's disease have two main features that are visible under the microscope, which are called amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles. While clinical studies of the cholesterol-lowering statin drugs have produced equivocal results in Alzheimer's disease, there have not yet been any studies of the effects of statin intake on brain pathology. This has now been rectified, with a report published in the journal Neurology.

University of Washington scientists examined the brains of 110 men and women who donated their brains for research purposes. They were between 65 and 80 when enrolled in the study. Their statin use was measured until the time of their death; statin users were defined as those who had received three or more prescriptions of at least 15 statin pills of a statin in each.

There was no difference in the occurrence of apparent dementia between statin users and nonusers. However, the statin users had fewer small degenerative lesions in the brain, and fewer neurofibrillary tangles (about half as many, in fact). There was no significant decrease in the number of amyloid plaques. But when the "scores" for tangles and plaques were combined to give a measure of typical Alzheimer pathology, the reduction of this in statin users was significant.

This is the first link between statin use and anatomical brain changes, but it's still not sufficient evidence to drive people into taking statins just because they're getting older, according to the investigators. Nevertheless, it's a broad hint ...

Source
HealthandAge Blog

Please take a moment to give us your comments. For questions about Health matters you may check our "Questions & Answers" Portal and Service.