CHICAGO – Statin drugs, prescribed to millions of adults to ward off heart attacks and strokes, can safely reduce cholesterol levels and even reverse narrowing of the arteries in children with inherited high cholesterol, a two-year Dutch study found.
About one in 500 children worldwide is born with familial hypercholesterolemia, a condition that can lead to heart attacks in early adulthood.
Cholesterol levels fell 24 percent in children ages 8-18 who were given pravastatin, sold as Pravachol, for two years. And narrowing of arteries reversed course with no serious side effects.
Lead author Dr. Albert Wiegman said the researchers were surprised to see reversal after just two years, and said it suggests the children may be less likely to have premature heart attacks in adulthood.
Similar effects have been seen in adults. Up to now, however, research on statins in children involved short-term use of the cholesterol-lowering drugs.
Dr. Gregory Wright of Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minneapolis and St. Paul said the study applies only to the inherited condition, and there is no way of knowing whether statins would work as well in children who have high cholesterol because of poor diet and lack of exercise. These youngsters account for the vast majority of children with high cholesterol.
A few statins have been approved in the United States specifically to treat familial hypercholesterolemia in children.
The study appears in today’s Journal of the American Medical Association.
It was funded primarily by the Prevention Fund of the Dutch government. Bristol-Myers Squibb, which makes Pravachol, also provided funding, but was not involved in the study design or analysis, Wiegman said.
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