Patients in this study with a history of statin use had a significantly greater chance of developing vitreous hemorrhage.
Patients in this study with a history of statin use had a significantly greater chance of developing vitreous hemorrhage. Photo: Getty Images. Click image to enlarge.

Statins are one of the most prescribed medications, notably for hypercholesterolemia treatment, and aid in primary and secondary cardiovascular disease prevention. Their use has been associated with lower rates of ophthalmic interventions. Investigating long-term outcomes with pars plana vitrectomy after a year post-op, a recent study has determined a range of outcomes: an increased risk of developing vitreous hemorrhage, retinal edema and vitreous opacities but a decreased risk of retinal vascular occlusion and lens dislocation. These findings were presented today at the 2022 ARVO annual meeting in Denver.

From a United States electronic health record network, the researchers identified 54,159 patients who had undergone vitrectomy and stratified them into statin vs. non-statin use cohorts with 13,592 patients in each. The team used propensity score matching to match the two cohorts for age, sex and other systemic comorbidities.

The cohort with prior history of statin use had a significantly higher risk of developing vitreous hemorrhage (risk ratio: 1.15), retinal edema (1.15), macular puckering (1.21), intraoperative complications of the eye (1.47), glaucoma (1.12), vitreous opacities (1.42) and ptosis (1.42).

The same group had a significantly lower risk of developing retinal vascular occlusion (0.7) and lens dislocation (0.75). No other significant differences were found between the two cohorts.

The researchers wrote in their abstract that they believe the increased risk of developing vitreous hemorrhage, retinal edema and vitreous opacities could possibly be due to statins’ biphasic effect on angiogenesis.

Original abstract content © Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology 2022.

Song H, Pakhchanian H, Raiker R, et al. Long-term outcomes of statin therapy on vitrectomy: a multicenter electronic medical record cohort study. ARVO 2022 annual meeting.