Associations between statin use and non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) risk and survival: a meta-analysis.

Evidence on the effect of statin use on non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) is not clear. We conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis to examine the associations between statin use and NHL risk and survival. We searched multiple literature sources up to October 2014 and identified 10 studies on the risk of diagnosis with NHL and 9 studies on survival. Random effects model was used to calculate pooled odds ratio (PORs) for risk and pooled hazard ratio (PHR) for survival. Heterogeneity among studies was examined using the Tau-squared and the I-squared (I2 ) tests. Statin use was associated with reduced risk for total NHL (POR = 0.82, 95% CI 0.69-0.99). Among statin users, there was a lower incidence risk for marginal zone lymphoma (POR = 0.54, 95% CI 0.31-0.94), but this was not observed for other types of NHL. However, statin use did not affect overall survival (PHR = 1.02, 95% CI 0.99-1.06) or event-free survival (PHR = 0.99, 95% CI 0.87-1.12) in diffuse large B-cell lymphoma. There is suggestive epidemiological evidence that statins decrease the risk of NHL, but they do not influence survival in NHL patients.