The Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (LLC) It is a type of cancer that progresses slowly and begins in the bone marrow stem cellswhich are responsible for producing blood cells. It is the most common type of leukemia among adults in the United States.
On the other hand, the small lymphocytic lymphoma (LLP) It is also a slow growth cancer and affects same immune system cells than the LLC. The main difference is that the LLP It does not originate in the bone marrowbut in lymphatic system fabrics like him spleen or lymph nodes.
A new study led by the University of Sharjah (United Arab Emirates) and published in the Blood Advances Magazine It reveals that patients with LLC or LLP who took statins at the beginning of their oncological treatment had 61% less risk of death, compared to those who did not use this type of medicines.
Statins and survival
«This is the first systematic evaluation of the relationship between the use of statins and survival in patients treated with directed therapies modern such as Ibrutinib », explains El Dr. Ahmad Abuhelwa, Main author of the study and attached professor of pharmaceutical practice at the University of Sharjah. “Our findings suggest a strong association between the use of statins and better survival in this population.”
Statins, commonly prescribed drugs to reduce cholesterol, have been linked in previous investigations with a decrease in mortality due to various types of cancer, including the LLC. However, until now its effects had not been evaluated in the context of contemporary oncological treatments, such as the Ibrutinib kinase tyrosine inhibitor.
Clinical trial analysis in 1,400 patients
The study analyzed the data of 1,467 patients With LLC or LLP, extracted from Four international clinical trials developed between 2012 and 2019. The participants were randomly assigned to different treatments: Ibrutinib a monotherapiacombinations of this with other drugs or Regimes without Ibrutinib.
Of the patients analyzed, 424 (29%) took statins at the beginning of treatment. The Median age It was 65 years and a 66% were men. In addition, the 92% of cases corresponded to LLCalready out of recent diagnosis, recurrent or resistant to previous therapies.
This study opens new lines of research on the adjuvant potential of statins in therapies against the LLC and the LLP, and raises the possibility of taking advantage of drugs already widely available for improve survival without introducing more aggressive or expensive treatments.
Global survival
The main assessment criteria of the study were survival Specific cancer (Time that patients lived after starting treatment before they die specifically because of their cancer), the global survival (Time that patients lived after starting the treatment, regardless of the cause of death) and progression -free survival (patients lived after starting treatment before their Cancer will get worse or died for any reason).
The secondary assessment criteria was the proportion of patients who experienced serious or potentially mortal adverse events. The median monitoring of all patients included in the four rehearsals was five years to Global and 22 months survival For progression -free survival.
Confusion factors
To take into account the possible confusion factors, the researchers adjusted their analysis based on variables that included The diagnosis of each patient, age, sex, weight, physical functioning (According to the evaluation of doctors), the severity of the disease, the time elapsed since the diagnosis, the number of coexisting diseases, the use of other medications for heart disease or high blood pressure and the specific treatment regime against the Cancer received.
The results showed that, regardless of any of these factors, the patients who took statins presented, on average, a 61% reduction in the risk of dying of cancer, A 38% reduction in the risk of dying due to any cause and a 26% reduction in the risk of disease progression. It should be noted that the use of statins did not increase the probability of serious or potentially mortal adverse events.
