Statin use and the prognosis of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma: a meta-analysis

Background: Association between statin use and prognosis in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) remains unknown. We performed a meta-analysis of follow-up studies to systematically evaluate the influence of statin use on clinical outcome in HCC patients. Methods: Studies were obtained via systematic search of PubMed, Cochrane’s Library, and Embase databases. A randomized-effect model was used to pool the results. Subgroup analyses were performed to evaluate the influence of study characteristics on the association. Results: Nine retrospective cohort studies were included. Overall, statin use was associated with a reduced all-cause mortality in HCC patients (risk ratio [RR]: 0.81, 95% CI: 0.74–0.88, P < 0.001; I(2) = 63%). Subgroup analyses showed similar results for patients with stage I-III HCC (RR: 0.83, 0.79, and 0.90 respectively, P all < 0.01) and patients after palliative therapy for HCC (RR: 0.80, P < 0.001), but not for patents with stage IV HCC (RR: 0.91, P = 0.28) or those after curative therapy (RR: 0.92, P = 0.20). However, the different between subgroups were not significant (both P > 0.05). Moreover, statin use was associated with reduced HCC-related mortality (RR: 0.78, P = 0.001) in overall patient population and HCC recurrence in patients after curative therapies (RR: 0.55, P < 0.001). Conclusions: Satin use is associated with reduced mortality and recurrence of HCC. These results should be validated in prospective cohort studies and randomized controlled trials.