Approximately 3800 patients who underwent elective cardiac surgery were analyzed for post-surgical acute kidney injury (AKI). AKI occurred in 21% of patients who initiated a statin within 100 days prior to surgery compared with 29% of patients without prior statin use. The adjusted relative risk for the effect of statin initiation on AKI was RR = 0.86 (95% CI: 0.74, 0.98). Thus, presurgical statin initiation is associated with a reduction in AKI risk after cardiac surgery.