The following is a summary of “Statin Therapy Is Associated With a Lower Risk of Heart Failure in Patients With Atrial Fibrillation: A Population‐Based Study,” published in the November 2023 issue of Cardiology by Huang et al.

The debate surrounding the potential of statin use in reducing heart failure (HF) risk persists. This study sought to scrutinize the correlation between statin use and HF occurrence among patients diagnosed with atrial fibrillation (AF).

From 2010 to 2018, individuals newly diagnosed with AF were considered for inclusion in this investigation. A sophisticated statistical method, inverse probability of treatment weighting, was employed to balance baseline characteristics between statin users (n=23 239) and statin nonusers (n=29 251). The primary endpoint was the emergence of incident HF. The analysis utilized Cox proportional hazard models alongside competing risk regression to compare HF risk between statin users and nonusers. The cohort’s median age stood at 74.7 years, with 47.3% being women. Over a median follow-up period of 5.1 years, incident HF was observed in 3,673 (15.8%) statin users and 5,595 (19.1%) statin nonusers. The findings revealed that statin use was linked to a noteworthy 19% reduction in HF risk (adjusted subdistribution hazard ratio, 0.81 [95% CI, 0.78–0.85]). The statin use duration during the follow-up period was scrutinized by analyzing statin users exclusively. Notably, there was a consistent decline in the risk of incident HF with increasing duration of statin use: 2 to <4 years (subdistribution hazard ratio, 0.86 [95% CI, 0.84–0.88]), 4 to <6 years (subdistribution hazard ratio, 0.74 [95% CI, 0.72–0.76]), and ≥6 years (subdistribution hazard ratio, 0.71 [95% CI, 0.69–0.74]), when compared to short-term use (3 months to <2 years). Subgroup analysis reinforced these findings, consistently showcasing reduced HF risk associated with statin use.

In conclusion, this study highlights a notable association between statin use and decreased incident HF risk among patients with atrial fibrillation, suggesting a duration-dependent pattern wherein longer-term statin use appears to confer greater protection against HF in this population.

Source: ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/JAHA.123.032378