A new study shows that a drug widely prescribed drug lowers cholesterol, but can not be beneficial for heart health, a paradoxical result that physicians discuss how the drug works and if it is. effective
The study found that the combination of a drug effective cholesterol-old, simvastatin, ezetimibe with the drug was no better than simvastatin alone in preventing arterial plaques - one the objectives of lowering cholesterol. The study was funded by Merck and Schering-Plough drug manufacturers. The results were a surprise. On the surface, the combination of two drugs had the upper air, reducing the blood concentration of the plate inducing low-density lipoprotein (LDL) about 15% more than the old one drug, doctors reported online March 30 in the New England Journal of Medicine and the annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology in Chicago, Illinois. The results contradict the notion established that lowering LDL reduces plaque buildup and slows the development of heart disease as well.
The reason for these results, some researchers think that, maybe, although both lower cholesterol drugs, they do it in different ways, and it can be more beneficial than the other. Simvastatin is a statin that blocks a liver enzyme needed to manufacture cholesterol, and thus stimulates the liver to draw more cholesterol from the blood stream. Ezetimibe, on the contrary, works by slowing the absorption of cholesterol from food by blocking a protein called scavenger receptor in the small intestine. Allen Taylor, a cardiologist at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, said it may be the problem. "This scavenger receptor also works throughout your body to clear cholesterol that you want to get rid of," Taylor said. "It's like not to take something new in your home, but you can not put no more garbage . "While LDL levels in the blood drop, he said, the body may have trouble getting rid of that little cholesterol, it absorbs.
Eric de Groot, a vascular-imaging specialist at university medical Center in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and author of the study, defends ezetimibe. He said most of the nearly 700 patients in the study had been treated with statins for 7 10 years, so their arteries were healthy enough, leaving little room for improvement due to the addition of the new drug. "I read in the press sometimes it is ... a useless drug," dit- he. "I totally disagree with that. This design does not prove that. "People without a history of statin use, he said, could see more benefits of ezetimibe.
Another study will be published in 2012 following the effects long-term health of ezetimibe on patients with heart disease. "This will be the big news," says Cynthia Jackevicius, an expert in the practice of pharmacy at the University of Western of health sciences in Pomona , California. "We're kind of in limbo until more information comes out."
Related Sites
- American Heart Association page on atherosclerosis
- Page American Heart Association on cholesterol
- science NOW on other benefits of statins
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