Is there A Role for Statins in the Treatment of Prostate Cancer?

I have returned from Michigan and again have the computer access and the time to continue sharing items relevant to our struggle.

Investigators at the Duke University Prostate Center have indicated that cholesterol-lowering drugs, statins, may reduce inflammation in prostate tumors, which might hinder prostate cancer growth.

“Previous studies have shown that men taking statins seem to have a lower incidence of advanced prostate cancer, but the mechanisms by which statins might be affecting the prostate remained largely unknown,” said Lionel Bañez, M.D., a researcher in the Duke Prostate Center and lead investigator on this study. “We looked at tumor samples and found that men who were on statins had a 72 percent reduction in risk for tumor inflammation, and we believe this might play a role in the connection between prostate cancer and statin use.”

These findings were presented at the American Urological Association’s (AUA) annual meeting on April 26, 2009. The United States Department of Defense (DOD) and the American Urological Association Foundation funded the study, so go back to my prior posts about the value of the DOD programs and why we need to contact our government representatives about increasing funding for the DOD Prostate Cancer Program.

The researchers looked at pathological information from the tumors of 254 men who underwent radical prostatectomy as a primary treatment for prostate cancer at the Durham Veterans Affairs Medical Center between 1993 and 2004. The removed prostate tissue was graded