Statins Linked to Improved Liver Health in MASLD

TOPLINE:

Statin usage in patients with metabolic dysfunction–associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD) is associated with a lower long-term risk for all-cause mortality, liver-related events, and progression of liver stiffness.

METHODOLOGY:

• Although many patients with MASLD have indications for statins, including cardiovascular disease, they are not widely used owing to concerns about possible liver damage and muscle weakness.
• Researchers conducted an observational cohort study to evaluate the long-term effects of statin use in 7988 patients (mean age, 53 years; 58.2% women) with MASLD who underwent at least two vibration-controlled transient elastography exams. The study involved 16 centers in the United States, Europe, and Asia.
• Patients were classified into those with compensated advanced chronic liver disease (cACLD; liver stiffness measurement ≥ 10 kPa) and those without cACLD (liver stiffness measurement < 10 kPa). At baseline, 17% of patients had cACLD.
• Statin prescriptions included simvastatin, pravastatin, atorvastatin, rosuvastatin, lovastatin, fluvastatin, and pitavastatin. At baseline, 40.5% of patients used statins.
• The primary outcome was the composite of all-cause mortality and liver-related events, including cirrhosis, hepatocellular carcinoma, or liver-related mortality. Secondary outcomes included changes in liver stiffness assessed over a median follow-up duration of 4.6 years.

TAKEAWAY:

• Statin usage was associated with a 76.7% lower risk for all-cause mortality and a 62% lower risk of liver-related events than non-use (both P < .001).
• Statin use also was associated with a 46% and 55% lower risk for liver stiffness progression in the cACLD and non-cACLD groups, respectively, than non-use (both P < .001).
• No significant association was found between statin use and liver stiffness regression.

IN PRACTICE:

“The results of this cohort study suggest that statin usage may help reduce CVD [cardiovascular disease] morbidity and mortality rates and slow down liver stiffness progression in both cACLD and non-cALCD patients,” the authors wrote.

SOURCE:

The study, led by Xiao-Dong Zhou, The First Affiliated Hospital of Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, China, was published online in Gut.

LIMITATIONS:

The assessment of patients at different intervals may have affected the interpretation of the data. The median follow-up period may be considered short for assessing the progression of CLD. Additionally, residual confounding in statin users could have led to an overestimation of the benefits of statins.

DISCLOSURES:

This study was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China and National Key R&D Program of China. Some authors reported receiving personal fees, consulting fees, speaker bureau fees, grants, nonfinancial support, and honoraria for lectures and travel expenses and owning stock options with pharmaceutical and medical device companies outside of the submitted work. Two researchers were employed by Echosens during the conduct of the study.

This article was created using several editorial tools, including AI, as part of the process. Human editors reviewed this content before publication.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.