[Treatment of older patients with dyslipidemia]

Elderly persons represent a growing percentage of the total population, and this tendency will become stronger in the coming years. To date, the little evidence available on primary and secondary prevention indicates that this population has high cholesterol levels, that few are under treatment, and that the degree of control requires improvement. Current guidelines recommend that treatment targets in older persons should be the same as those in younger patients. Nevertheless, it is important to remember certain characteristics in older persons, such as biological and metabolic changes or the higher incidence of atherogenic dyslipidemia, which will affect them. Moreover, quality of life and maintaining independence rather than mere survival are especially important in older individuals, as demonstrated by various surveys. Consequently, pravastatin -the most widely studied statin- seems to be the statin of choice for the control of triglycerides and residual risk, although fenofibrate is also useful.