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statin

statin

13 4.9
A medicine that lowers cholesterol in the blood and reduces the risk of heart attack
  • noun
  • /ˈstætɪn/
  • Specialized
translation icon : estatina
  • Doctors often prescribe statins to patients with high cholesterol to help reduce their heart disease risk.
  • statin therapy
  • take statins
  • statins reduce

What makes this drug special is, unlike statins, this drug only works in the liver.

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Examples

  • Prescribing a statin is easy: getting someone to change their lifestyle is not.

    Academic text (2015)
  • Our patient, Eric, is concerned that his aches and pains are brought on by his statin treatment.

    Academic text (2015)
  • Unfortunately, it is not at all clear that taking a statin for primary prevention will do people any good.

    Academic text (2015)
  • For comparison, those who manage to take their statin pills cut their risk by a third.

    Academic text (2009)
  • Actually all the statins to some degree will raise your blood sugar.

  • There is good evidence that statins lower the relative risk of cardiovascular events by 27%.

    Academic text (2011)
  • Recent research has suggested that treatment with statins for individuals with moderate renal disease may slow disease progression.

    Academic text (2007)
  • Despite these potential benefits, some patients decline or discontinue statins because of anticipated or experienced adverse effects.

    Academic text (2015)
  • In patients with or without initial cognitive impairment, statins do not increase the risk for adverse cognitive effects.

    Academic text (2015)
  • The first one is that statins actually have other properties other than lowering LDL cholesterol.

Synonyms

statin drug
vsstatin
  • Specialized
2 4.1

A medicine that lowers cholesterol in the blood

is the shorter, single word form with identical meaning
lipid-lowering medicine
vsstatin
  • Specialized
3.5

A medicine that lowers cholesterol in the blood

is the scientific term for this enzyme inhibiting drug class
lipid-lowering medication
vsstatin
  • Specialized
4.3

A medicine that reduces fat, especially cholesterol, in the blood

is specific to drugs that block HMG-CoA reductase rather than other enzymes

Compounds

statin drug
  • Specialized
2 4.1

A medicine that lowers cholesterol in the blood

Surface Forms

statin singular
statins plural

Morphology

statin = lovastatin (opaque) = stat + in

The term is a technical class name created by pharmaceutical naming patterns and is not transparently analyzable by an average learner from general English morphemes.

Etymology

Statin A helpful way to remember the word statin is to think of the part stat-, which suggests 'to stop', as in the English word static. So, statins are medicines that 'stop' the body from making too much cholesterol and so lower cholesterol levels.