Statins

Hypercholesterolemia, or high blood cholesterol, is not a disease state in itself but can be a result of or precursor to other diseases, including cardiovascular disease. The elevation of cholesterol in the blood can be due to diet, genetic factors, and the presence of other disease states such as thyroid gland dysfunction or diabetes. Diet and exercise are considered to be the first-line treatment options for the treatment of hypercholesterolemia. If these lifestyle modifications prove ineffective in lowering the patient's cholesterol level, a medication from the statin class is then considered the drug of choice. The statins, also referred to as 3-hydroxy-3-methylglutaryl coenzyme A (HMG-CoA) reductase inhibitors, have the greatest efficacy among all other lipid-lowering medication classes in decreasing low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol, more commonly ...