Statins help prevent heart attacks.
By Dileep Thekkethil
An international medical research team, headed by an Indo-Canadian researcher, has proven three simple, but effective solutions to prevent heart attacks and strokes worldwide.
According to Dr. Salim Yusuf, the director of Population Health Research Institute of McMaster University, the research was conducted on more than 12,000 patients across 21 countries to evaluate drugs that can prevent cardiovascular diseases (CVD).
The research says that cardiovascular disease caused 18 million deaths a year in addition to about 50 million incidents of heart attacks and strokes.
Dr. Salim was quoted by MedicalXpress.com saying: “These are incredibly important findings with potential for significant global impact.
He added: “If just 10 percent of the world’s population at intermediate risk of CVD is impacted, we’re talking about 20 to 30 million people who could be helped by these drugs.”
The proven methods to effectively counter cardio disease include two different therapies. Statins, a set of medicines that control cholesterol, and antihypertensive, a group of drug that reduces high blood pressure.
The researchers also checked and proved the possibility of a combination medicine made of – statins and antihypertensive to effectively counter CVD.
The details about the three effective methods to prevent heart attacks and stroke was published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
The research has been rightly named as HOPE-3 (Heart Outcomes Prevention Evaluation-3). The study was conducted in 228 identified centres and the researchers studied the effects of all three treatments in people who were in the intermediate risk, but without, clinical heart disease.
The study says that patients with intermediate risk without cardiovascular disease who were administered with statins significantly and safely reduced the chances of inflicting the disease by 25%.
On the other hand, antihypertensive did not decrease the condition of CVD in most of the patients but the study found that patients administered with this group of medicines with a history of hypertension, reduced their chances of CVD events.
The researchers also said that the combination medicine – stains combined with antihypertensives, reduced the CVD events in people by 30%. The same combination proved 40% more effective in people with hypertension.
The researchers conclude that patients with hypertension should not only take drugs to bring down blood pressure but should also consider taking a statin.
The HOPE-3 research was headed by Dr Yusuf and Dr. Eva Lonn, both professors of medicine of McMaster’s Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine. Jackie Bosch, an associate professor of the university’s School of Rehabilitation Science also mde key contributions to the research.
“The HOPE-3 trial brings clarity in the management of blood pressure and cholesterol, two of the most common cardiovascular risk factors,” said Lonn. “Primary prevention can be greatly simplified and made available to most intermediate-risk people worldwide.”
Bosch added: “Treatment with a statin was remarkably safe and beneficial in our study, regardless of cholesterol or blood pressure levels, age, gender or ethnicity. We are incredibly encouraged by the study’s results.”
According to Dr. Yusuf, the findings of HOPE-3 research will be incremental in primary health care in developed country where statins and antihypertensives are not cheap. He also added that even though these medicines are less expensive in developing nations, considering their income, the medicines are less affordable.
The findings of the research have a far reaching impact as it can reduce the price of the drugs across the world.
“These simple methods can be used practically everywhere in the world, and the drugs will become even cheaper as more and more systems and people adopt these therapies,” he said.
Yusuf, Lonn and Bosch are presenting the HOPE-3 trials at the 2016 American College of Cardiology (ACC) Scientific Session and Expo in Chicago this weekend.