Association of Statin Usage and the Development of Diabetes Mellitus after Acute Pancreatitis

Background Patients with acute pancreatitis (AP) have at least a 2-fold higher risk for developing postpancreatitis diabetes mellitus (PPDM). No therapies have prevented PPDM. Statins were demonstrated to possibly lower the incidence and severity of AP but have not been studied to prevent PPDM. Methods Data from a commercial insurance claim database (Optum Clinformatics) were used to assess the impact of statins on patients without pre-existing DM admitted for a first episode of AP in 118,479 patients. Regular statin usage was defined as filled statin prescriptions for at least 80% of the year prior to AP. The primary outcome was defined as PPDM. We constructed a propensity score and applied inverse probability of treatment weighting to balance baseline characteristics between groups. Using Cox proportional hazards regression modeling, we estimated the risk of PPDM, accounting for competing events. Results With a median of 3.5 years of follow-up, the 5-year cumulative incidence of PPDM was 7.5% (95% confidence interval [CI], 6.9% to 8.0%) among regular statin users and 12.7% (95% CI, 12.4% to 12.9%) among nonusers. Regular statin users had a 42% lower risk of developing PPDM compared with nonusers (hazard ratio, 0.58; 95% CI, 0.52 to 0.65; P < .001). Irregular statin users had a 15% lower risk of PPDM (hazard ratio, 0.85; 95% CI, 0.81 to 0.89; P < .001). Similar benefits were seen with low, moderate, and high statin doses. Conclusions In a large database-based study, statin usage reduced the risk of developing DM after acute pancreatitis. Further prospective studies with long-term follow-up are needed to study the impact of statins on acute pancreatitis and prevention of PPDM.