Statins for the prevention of Alzheimer's disease.

: Two recent clinical reports describe an association between statin therapy and a reduction in the occurrence of Alzheimer's disease by as much as 70 %. One report is a cross-sectional analysis of discharges among three hospitals, and the other is a nested case control study drawn from ambulatory patients of general practitioners in the UK. Because neither study is a randomized trial, the association noted between statin therapy and a reduced incidence of Alzheimer's disease may have occurred because other factors, unaccounted for in the studies, may be present (so called bias) and be responsible for the observed association. However, there is an expanding body of biological and epidemiological data that makes it plausible that statin therapy may retard or prevent the pathogenesis and clinical expression of Alzheimer's disease. This review was initiated in order to find other clinical evidence that might support or refute the hypothesized benefit of statin therapy.