An Interesting Chinese Study

[Lenin]

Department of Epidemiology, Institute of Beijing Heart, Lung and Blood Vessel Diseases, Beijing 100029, China.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the association between serum total cholesterol (TC) and the risk of cardiovascular diseases (CVD) in subjects aged 35-64 years. METHODS: This prospective study was performed from 1992 to 2002 in 11 provinces of China and the association between baseline TC level and the development of cardiovascular diseases was analyzed in 30,384 subjects aged 35-64 years using Cox multivariate proportional hazards regression. RESULTS: (1) Compared with the group of TC < 3.64 mmol/L (140 mg/dl), multivariate-adjusted relative risk of ischemic cardiovascular disease (ICVD, including CHD and ischemic stroke) increased continuously with increasing TC level. (2) TC level was positively related to the occurrence of ischemic stroke, but not to hemorrhagic stroke. The risk of CHD increased by 74% (RR = 1.743) and the risk of ischemic stroke increased by 12% (RR = 1.119) in the group with TC > or = 5.72 mmol/L compared with the group with TC < 5.72 mmol/L (220 mg/dl). (3) High serum cholesterol was responsible to 5.9% of ICVD, 11.7% of the acute CHD and 2.9% of the acute stroke. (4) At each TC level, the 10-year risk of ICVD increased in the presence of other risk factors. CONCLUSION: Starting from TC of 3.64 mmol/L, the risk of ICVD increases continuously with increasing TC level. Multiple risk factor intervention should be strengthened to reduce the overall risk of CVD.

Work was by Wang, Zhou, Liu, Zeng, Sun, Liu, Qin, and Wu

Even with the Chinese diet, the direct correlation between higher cholesterol and extremely higher risk of heart disease and ischemic strok is quite evident.
Studying 30,000 people over 10 years and starting BEFORE the invention of statin drugs makes this one of the most powerful studies into the cause of heart disease and stroke ever done.

[Schroddfather]

Say, Lenin? Would you mind translating that data for us? I can't follow the jargon.

[Uff-Da!]

This study included both men and women, did it? If so, was there a separate analysis by sex? There have been so many studies regarding cholesterol which showed good results for middle-aged men, but those few which included and analyzed results for women separately just haven't looked as good for women. I'm willing to be convinced, but so far haven't seen enough results to buy into it for women and for the elderly.

[Lenin]

evvo,
Thanks for the correction. Yes Mev@cor (generic: lovastatin) was approved in 1987 and got good sales in 1988. THus it and Pravachol are already out of patent.

I usually think in terms of the BIG statins simvastatin and atorvastatin which were introduced in the '90's. In any case I doubt many of the 30,000 Chinese began the study on statins and probably VERY, if any, few ended the study on them.

Alas, all I could get was the abstract...the details cost $$$. THus I don't know the sex breakdown of the study population. They were smart enought to pick a population with a top age of 64. That way most of the population could be expected to be alive at the end ! A 10 year study of 75 year olds might be dicey.
Probably the complete study might reveal any sex driven variations.