Statin is an established drug to prevent stroke and cardiovascular diseases and, currently, various formulations of statins are used in clinical practice. Although the biologic effect is expected to be similar between the generic and brand statins, th...
Statin is an established drug to prevent stroke and cardiovascular diseases and, currently, various formulations of statins are used in clinical practice. Although the biologic effect is expected to be similar between the generic and brand statins, the difference of pharmacologic effect between them has not systemically investigated yet.
Data were obtained from the Korean National Health Insurance Service database, which covers nearly all Korean population. Eligibilities for inclusion were dyslipidemia without established cardiovascular disease or stroke with age >30 years between January 1, 2009 to December 31, 2018. Among those, only atorvastatin and rosuvastatin users were included. The difference of changes of lipid profiles before and after statin treatment were compared between groups. The group effect between generic and brand drugs were investigated for the efficacy (major adverse cardiovascular-cerebrovascular events, all-cause of death, ischemic stroke, and hemorrhagic stroke) and safety (any cancer, new onset diabetes, hepatitis, and myopathy). The patients were classified into generic statin group and brand statin group and the effect of the class were explored using time-dependent survival analysis.
Finally, a total of 84,927 patients (brand group n = 18,058; generic group n = 66,869; atorvastatin = 45,838; rosuvastatin n = 39,089) were included in this study (mean age, 53.8 ± 9.5 years; 56.7% female). The total observation period was 49389.3 person years. The proportion of brand statin group dominated that of generic statin group in tertiary medical centers (60.9%), however, only 16.9% of patients were prescribed for brand statin from the private clinic.
Each group of statins produced favorable changes of lipid profiles, but the magnitude of difference was different between generic group and brand group: brand atorvastatin group produced a larger LDL-cholesterol and total cholesterol reduction than generic atorvastatin group in low dose atorvastatin group; brand rosuvastatin produced a larger LDL-cholesterol and total cholesterol reduction than generic rosuvastatin group irrespective of the dose.
There was no difference of the efficacy end-points between generic and brand groups except for acute coronary disease and death (brand group, hazard ratio (HR) 1.25, 95% confidence interval 1.14 – 1.37, p = 0.01), and Acute coronary syndrome (brand group, hazard ratio (HR) 1.39, 95% CI 1.24 – 1.56, p = 0.01). Among the safety end-points, the risk of decreased in the brand group than the generic group. In the atorvastatin group, the trend was similar to that of the entire group, and in the rosuvastatin group, the risk ratio of acute coronary disease (brand group, hazard ratio (HR) 1.29, 95% CI 1.06 – 1.57, p = 0.010), and ischemic stroke (brand group, hazard ratio (HR) 2.21, 95% CI 1.08 – 4.53, p = 0.029). These results suggest that the effects of brand and generic groups on cholesterol reduction and the prevention of vascular diseases are not the same.
Brand statins showed higher lipid-lowering effect for total cholesterol and LDL-cholesterol than generic statins. In terms of efficacy, brand statin showed a higher risk for the composite outcome or acute coronary syndrome and similar effect for the stroke risk to the generic statins. Brand statins showed better safety profile than generic statins despite the stronger lipid-lowering effect. These results strongly suggests that there is difference of the clinico-pharmacological effect of statin between brand and generic statin.