A Southern Connecticut State University study explores the link between cholesterol-lowering drugs called statins and Type 2 Diabetes.
The FDA put a warning label on some statins in 2014 saying the drugs may contribute to higher blood glucose levels. Victoria Zigmont with SCSU says the link is well-established, at least on paper.
“There have been quite a few studies that have been done. However, they haven’t been done looking at everyday-type people population.”
Zigmont looked at a database of thousands of statin users to try to find a correlation.
“I was very interested in looking at the real world picture of how efforts to reduce heart disease may be contributing to Type 2 Diabetes.”
She found statin users are about twice as likely overall to develop diabetes. And they’re three times more likely to do so if they use statins for more than two years.
“Statins are associated with insulin resistance. There is definitely a lot more research that’s needed focusing on the changes that take place in human metabolism from statin use, but there have been other studies that have corroborated these similar findings.”
She says as health experts collect more and more data from statin users, they’ll be able to get a clearer picture of which specific statins could pose more of a risk.
