OBJECTIVES: to assess the impact of switching from Rosuvastatin to any other lipid lowering therapy on clinical outcomes in primary care. METHODS: a retrospective analysis based on data extracted from IMS Health Longitudinal Patient Database (IMS Health LPD). All new patients being treated with rosuvastatin (10-20 mg) between 1st January 2011 and 31th December 2013 were included in the analysis and the date of the first prescription was defined as the Index Date (ID). Exclusion criteria were the occurrence of an acute myocardial infarction (AMI) during the six months before the ID and the presence of at least one prescription of another statine in addition to rosuvastatin at the ID. Starting from the ID, patients were followed up until September 2015 or until one of the following event occurred first: statin treatment discontinuation, occurrence of an AMI or death. RESULTS: The final cohort was composed of 10,368 new patients being treated with rosuvastatin from 2011 to 2013. During the period of observation, 2,452 (23,6%) patients switched from rosuvastatin to another lipid lowering treatment, particularly to atorvastatin (56%) and simvastatin (25%). Factors associated with a higher probability of switch were female gender (HR=1.10, 95% CI:1.02-1.19, p=0.04) and the presence of Chronic Kidney Disease (HR=1.47, 95% CI:1.16-1.86, p=0.05). AMI occurred in 87 patients treated with rosuvastatin (incidence of 6.7 AMI/1000 PY), and in 26 patients switched to another lipid lowering treatment (incidence of 8.3 AMI/1000 PY). Cox proportional hazards model, including switching as a time-dependent covariate, showed that changing from rosuvastatin to another lipid lowering therapy was an independent predictor of AMI (HR 2.2, 95% CI 1.4–3.5, p=0.001). CONCLUSIONS: Switching from rosuvastatin to another lipid lowering treatment may impart an increased risk of experiencing an AMI and should be avoided unless strictly necessary on clinical grounds.