The current study identified 3638 patients in the English cancer registry who had a new diagnosis of lung cancer between 1998 and 2009 who had at least one year of follow-up after their diagnosis, and used the UK Clinical Practice Research Datalink to allow analysis of the drugs they had been prescribed. Although there was a trend towards a reduction in lung cancer specific mortality associated with any prescription for a statin after a diagnosis of lung cancer (HR 0.89; 95% CI 0.78 to 1.02; P=0.09), it was only statistically significant in the subgroup who had more than 12 statin prescriptions. It was also more pronounced when only lipophilic statins (e.g. simvastatin) were investigated (adjusted HR 0.81; 95% CI 0.70–0.94; P=0.01).
The magnitude of the observed effect was relatively small and the study is limited by its observational design, with the possibility of unmeasured confounders. The authors say that their findings should therefore first be replicated in further observational studies, before consideration is given to evaluating the potential role of statins as an adjuvant therapy in lung cancer.