Word: simvastatin
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Until now. Last week at the American Heart Association meeting in Dallas, a team of Scandinavian scientists presented results of such stunning clarity that doubts about cholesterol drugs may finally be put to rest. In a trial involving nearly 4,500 patients, a drug called simvastatin not only cut harmful cholesterol 35% but also reduced the death rate (compared with a control group) 30%. "This is a seminal study," says Dr. Suzanne Oparil, president of the American Heart Association. "It has profound implications for the practice of medicine...
...recently, drugs were not much better. That changed in 1987, when the first of a new class of compounds -- called statins -- was approved for use in the U.S. Statins reduce cholesterol by blocking production of a key enzyme needed to manufacture lipoproteins. Scientists predicted that if a drug like simvastatin were put to a long-term test, it would reduce death rates by one-third...
Which is precisely what happened. The subjects of the Scandinavian study -- all of them heart-disease patients -- were advised to stop smoking and follow sensible diets. In addition, half received daily doses of simvastatin, while the rest took a placebo. The effects were striking. Patients who took the drug registered a 35% drop in levels of bad cholesterol and an 8% rise in good.They also required fewer hospitalizations and surgical procedures. Best of all, they experienced 42% fewer deaths from heart disease and no increase | in deaths from other causes...