Improved Lipid Target Level Attainment in Patients with Peripheral Artery Disease

Patients with peripheral artery disease (PAD) fall under the category of a very high cardiovascular risk. Although consequent lipid-lowering therapy (LLT) is advised, only sparse data on attained target level in PAD exists.

We aimed to analyse contemporary guideline recommendations for LLT in symptomatic PAD patients.

A monocentric, prospective, observational study involving 200 symptomatic PAD patients was conducted. Guideline target level attainment and LLT were analysed between 2017 and 2019.

Overall, 78.5% of the patients were on statin therapy, mainly of high intensity, with atorvastatin in 50% and rosuvastatin in 33% of the cases. The average statin dosage adjusted for simvastatin was 55 mg/d. Low density lipoprotein-cholesterol (LDL-C) was <1.8 mmol/L in 53% and <1.4 mmol/L in 34% of the cases. Mean LDL-C levels were at 1.85 ± 0.88 mmol/L. We observed no difference in the treatment and the target level attainment of patients with a stable PAD (intermittent claudication) or chronic critical PAD. However, patients with ≥ 1 vascular region affected (i.e., coronary and/or cerebrovascular) were treated more intensively and had lower LDL-C levels than patients with PAD alone.

It appears that there are more awareness and improvement of previously documented undertreatment of LDL-C levels in symptomatic PAD patients. Although statin treatment is initiated in the majority of patients, our findings call for a continuously intensified LLT in symptomatic PAD patients.