Patients with lung cancer have a lower risk of death if they are taking statins, findings from an observational study suggest.

The study of 14 689 patients with lung cancer who had more than 12 prescriptions for statins after their  diagnosis had their lung cancer specific mortality reduced by a fifth (adjusted hazard ratio 0.81 (0.67 to 0.98); P=0.03).

A similar reduction in risk was seen in patients taking the lipophilic statin simvastatin for any duration, reported the authors in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention.

While the study had limitations such as its observational nature leaving the results open to confounding the findings supported further investigation into the use of statins as adjuvant cancer therapy, the authors said.