The association of statins use with survival of covid-19 patients

ABSTRACT

Introduction: Statins are frequently prescribed for patients with hypertension, dyslipidemia and diabetes mellitus. These comorbidities are highly prevalent in COVID-19 patients. Statin's beneficial effect on mortalities in COVID-19 infection has been reported in several studies, but still inconclusive. Hypothesis: The inconclusive study results in association of satin use and COVID-19 can be resulted from variable timing of statins used among the studies. Our aim was to investigate whether consistent use of statins before and during hospitalization was effective to decrease the mortality due to COVID-19. Methods: We conducted a retrospective study among 6,095 patients with COVID-19 hospitalized in New York City between March 1st 2020 and May 7th 2021. Patients were stratified into two groups statins use prior or during hospitalization (N=2,423) versus no statins (N=3,672). We evaluated inhospital mortality as a primary outcome using propensity score matching and inverse probability treatment weighted (IPTW) analysis. In addition, we compared continuous use of statins (N=1,108) versus no statins. Results: Statins use prior or during hospitalization group were older (70.8±12.7 versus 59.2±18.2, P<0.001) and had more comorbidities compared to no statins group. After matching by propensity score (1,790 pairs), there were no significant differences in in-hospital mortality between patients with statins versus those without (28.9% versus 31.0%, P=0.19, odds ratio (OR) [95% confidence interval (CI)] 0.91 [0.79-1.05]). This result was confirmed using IPTW analysis (OR [95% CI] 0.96 [0.81-1.12], P=0.53). As the additional analysis comparing continuous use of statins versus no statins group, in-hospital mortality was significantly lower in continuous use of statins compared to no statins group (26.3% versus 34.5%, P<0.001, OR [95% CI] 0.68 [0.55-0.82]) after matching by propensity score (944 pairs). IPTW analysis showed the similar result (OR [95% CI] 0.77 [0.64-0.94], P=0.009). Conclusions: Use of statins prior or during hospitalization was not associated with a decreased risk of in-hospital mortality, however, continuous use of statins might have potential benefit of a decreased risk of in-hospital mortality due to COVID-19.