Objective: To evaluate whether long-term statin use may affect motor progression in a large cohort of de novo patients with Parkinson’s Disease.

Background: Statins are speculated to be neuroprotective and are associated with the reduced risk of PD but only a few studies have investigated the influence of statins on PD progression.

Method: We conducted a 4-year retrospective observational cohort study assessing patients with PD who were consecutively recruited from a single tertiary center between January 2015 and January 2017. Information on motor function was obtained using the MDS-Unified Parkinson Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS)-III and all subjects were extensively characterized, including about lifestyle habits, cardiovascular risk factors and cholesterol blood levels.

Results: Of the 181 participants included in the study, 104 patients were evaluated for eligibility (42 patients were exposed to statin therapies and 62 were not treated with statins). Patients presented similar scores in UPDRS III at baseline but statin users had a lower motor impairment at 4 years compared to non-users PD patients. Additionally, statin treatment resulted in less progression of rigidity score of UPDRS over 4 years. No other significant differences were observed between PD patients with and without statins.

Conclusion: Early PD patients with long-term statin usage showed lower motor deterioration after 4 years of disease duration compared with patients not taking statins at diagnosis, suggesting a possible influence of statins on disease progression in PD. Further investigation is warranted in order to understand the potential beneficial effects of statin treatment on clinical symptoms in PD.

References: [1] Carroll CB, et al. (2019) Simvastatin as a neuroprotective treatment for Parkinson’s disease (PD STAT): protocol for a double-blind, randomised, placebo-controlled futility study. BMJ Open 9, e029740. [2] Carroll CB, et al. (2019) Statins and Parkinson’s: A complex interaction. Mov Disord 34,934-935. [3] Lin CH, et al. (2021) A Double-Blind, Randomized, Controlled Trial of Lovastatin in Early-Stage Parkinson’s Disease. Mov Disord doi: 10.1002/mds.28474.

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MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/statins-in-parkinsons-disease-influence-on-motor-progression/