Higher cholesterol levels associated with higher survival rates in intensive care patients with pneumonia

This study was published in the Journal of Critical Care 2015 Jun;30(3):506-10

Study title and authors:
Decreased serum level of lipoprotein cholesterol is a poor prognostic factor for patients with severe community-acquired pneumonia that required intensive care unit admission.

Chien YF, Chen CY, Hsu CL, Chen KY, Yu CJ.
Department of Laboratory Medicine, National Taiwan University Hospital Yunlin Branch, Yunlin County, Taiwan.

This study can be accessed at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25702844

The purpose of this study was to investigate the prognostic values of cholesterol in patients with severe community-acquired pneumonia that required intensive care unit admission. The study included 40 patients who had their cholesterol levels measured on day 1 and day 7 of their intensive care unit stay.

The study found:
(a) The HDL cholesterol levels of patients who survived by day 7 was 221% higher than the patients who died.
(b) The LDL cholesterol levels of patients who survived by day 7 was 105% higher than the patients who died.