Comparative drug evaluation of atorvastatin versus rosuvastatin in pharmacotherapy of Korean patients with dyslipidemia

Dyslipidemia is the multiple lipid metabolic disorders which is one of the high risk factors for the atherosclerotic diseases. It increases the morbidity and mortality and therefore, must be treated with antilipidemic agents. HMG-Co A reductase inhibitors (statins), one of many antidyslipidemic agents, have shown to be significant improvement from the various cholesterol levels. Especially, data from many comparative trials suggest that rosuvastatin is more effective than atorvastatin among many other statins. The aims of this study were to evaluate the efficacy and safety between rosuvastatin and atorvastatin in the treatment of Korean patients with dyslipidemia. Currently the Korean Society of Lipidology and Atherosclerosis based on the Korean health screening data suggests that Korean patients with dyslipidemia should be treated by the target cholesterol levels according to the Adult Treatment Panel III guidelines of the US National Cholesterol Education Program (NCEP-ATP III). We reviewed retrospectively all medical histories of the total 392 dyslipidemic patients with atorvastatin or rosuvastatin from June 1st, 2004 to August 31st, 2006 in Chungbuk National University Medical Center. Patients were classified as total 4 groups by the NCEP-ATP III Guidelines. The numbers of enrolled patients were each 5 mg atorvastatin (n=34), 10 mg atorvastatin (n=148), 5 mg rosuvastatin (n=94) and 10 mg rosuvastatin (n=82). In comparison between groups, rosuvastatin groups in the lowering LDL-C had better efficacies, and the results were each 22% (5 mg atorvastatin), 33.3% (10 mg atorvastatin), 35% (5 mg rosuvastatin) and 41.3% (10 mg rosuvastatin) with the dose relationship (P=0.000). Rosuvastatin groups also have shown to be more significantly reducing Total Cholesterol levels compared to atorvastatin groups with the no dose relationship (P=0.000). In the lowering of non-HDL cholesteroles, rosuvastatin groups showed significantly better efficacies than atorvastatin with the dose-relationship (P=0.000). Each medication groups did not demonstrate the differences in the changing of HDL cholesterol and triglyceride levels (P=0.096, 0.309, respectively). In conclusion, rosuvastatin was better efficacious than atrovastatin in reducing LDL-C Total Chol, and Tg. Therefore, rosuvastatin is a good antilipidemic agents for Korean patients with dyslipidemia and it can use to minimize the morbidity and mortality related to the cardiovascular diseases in Korean.