Are statins the best way to lower my cholesterol?

Statin use is already widespread and is increasing every year. But are the drugs right for everyone?

- by HAYLEY BENNETT

More of us than ever are taking statins. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) reported in October 2024 that around 5.3 million people in England had taken statins or the cholesterol-lowering medication ezetimibe in the previous year. That's almost triple the figure for 2015/2016 and approaching 10 per cent of the country's population. Meanwhile, statin use is also increasing globally.

Doctors prescribe statins to help prevent heart disease – currently the leading cause of death worldwide. They reduce low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol - the 'bad' type that clogs up arteries – by interfering with enzymes that our livers use to make cholesterol and helping draw it out of the blood. This makes statins effective at preventing heart attacks and strokes, but that alone doesn't answer all the questions people have before they decide to start taking drugs like these. Questions like: if I have high cholesterol, do I have to take statins? Can I try changing my diet and doing more exercise first? And what kinds of side effects can I expect if I do start taking statins?

The answer to the first two questions is the same: it's up to you. The decision to start taking statins is one you should arrive at with the help of your doctor, and it should be based on your overall risk of heart disease – not just your cholesterol level. That means considering other risk factors such as your blood pressure, family history and even your postcode.

As Julie Ward, a senior cardiac nurse at the British Heart Foundation, explains, doctors use all this information to calculate your personal cardiovascular risk score, which tells you how likely you are to have a heart attack or stroke in the next ten years.