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For people with coronary heart disease (CHD), practice guidelines recommend reducing low-density lipoprotein (LDL) levels to below 100 mg/dL and state that further reduction to below 70 mg/dL is reasonable. In a secondary analysis of a manufacturer-funded randomized trial, investigators studied patients with CHD (age ≥65) who had achieved LDL cholesterol levels below 130 mg/dL after receiving 10 mg of atorvastatin daily for 8 weeks, who were then randomized to receive either 10 mg or 80 mg of atorvastatin daily. At 12 weeks, mean LDL levels were 72 mg/dL for patients who received 80 mg and 97 mg/dL for those who continued on 10 mg.
During a median of 4.9 years, the high-dose group had significantly lower risk than the low-dose group (10.3% v…