Heart Drugs May Help Lungs Too

Statins are already among the top-selling prescription drugs in the U.S. for the treatment of heart disease. Now, a new study suggests that the popular cholesterol-lowering drugs have a significant additional benefit: slowing the lung deterioration that occurs naturally with age — and is often worsened by cigarette smoking.

Researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health report in the October 15 issue of the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine that patients who took statins to manage their heart disease maintained stronger lung function over a 10-year period than people who never used the medicines.

Recent studies have proved that statins not only control lipids, but are also potent regulators of inflammation — a key cause of lung deterioration. That's what led Joel Schwartz, an epidemiologist studying pollution and lung function, to examine the effects of statins. He and his colleagues looked at data on 803 subjects involved in the ongoing Veterans Administration Normative Aging Study, all of whom had their lung function measured in so-called spirometer-based breathing tests between 1995 and 2005. "It's interesting that we saw such a big effect here," Schwartz says. The statin users showed half the rate of respiratory decline than non-statin users did, and, even more encouraging, long-term smoking quitters appeared to get as much benefit from statins as recent quitters.

Such findings may someday offer hope for millions of American suffering from lung diseases such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), emphysema and chronic bronchitis. Schwartz stresses that his study was not a clinical one with randomized subjects, but lung experts agree that Schwartz's group has highlighted an intriguing association that deserves further study. "These findings will be highly embraced by the pulmonary community," says Dr. Michael Roth, professor of pulmonary and critical care medicine at UCLA Medical Center.

What excites researchers most is the possibility that statins may help in regenerating deteriorating lung tissue. "Over the last few years, there have been a growing number of studies showing that lung tissue can actually regenerate itself and that the rate of deterioration can be slowed down by turning on genes and pathways that protect lung tissue," he says. "This study provides one more potential piece of evidence that [such regeneration] possibly represents an entirely new approach to treating lung disease." And that would certainly help millions more Americans to breathe easier.