New Guidelines on Statins Drop Rigid Targets for Cholesterol

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New Guidelines on Statins Drop Rigid Targets for Cholesterol

The nation’s leading heart organizations, the American Heart Association and the American College of Cardiology, released new guidelines Tuesday that will fundamentally reshape the use of cholesterol-lowering statin medicines that are now prescribed for a quarter of Americans over 40. Patients on statins will no longer need to lower their cholesterol levels to specific numerical targets monitored by regular blood tests, as has been recommended for decades. Simply taking the right dose of a statin will be sufficient, the guidelines say.
The new guidelines, based on a four-year review of the evidence, also simplify the current complex, five-step process for evaluating who needs to take statins. In a significant departure, the new method also counts strokes as well as heart attacks in its risk calculations, a step that will likely make more people candidates for the drugs.

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