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ORLANDO, Fla., Mar 21 (Reuters Health) - Two studies presented during the closing hours of this year's annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology show that treatment with two cholesterol-reducing statin drugs also reduce levels of a marker of inflammation that is linked to risk of heart disease.
Pravastatin (Pravachol, Bristol Myers Squibb) or simvastatin (Zocor, Merck) both lower levels of an inflammatory molecule called C-reactive protein (CRP), according to the reports. Past studies have suggested that people with higher blood levels of CRP are at increased risk for heart attack.
In the first study, Dr. Paul M. Ridker of Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts, and colleagues randomly assigned more than 1,300 patients with no evidence of heart disease to either pravastatin or an inactive placebo, and another 898 patients with proven cardiovascular disease to pravastatin. Investigators measured blood fats and CRP levels at the beginning of the study and after 12 and 24 weeks.
Ridker told meeting attendees that pravastatin therapy resulted in a 13% drop in CRP levels. He pointed out that cholesterol "drives the inflammatory response to injury," which causes the rise in CRP. Reducing cholesterol may reduce the injury, thereby reducing CRP.
Ridker said that he hopes that the study will encourage doctors to be more aggressive in their prescribing of statin therapy.
In a second study, conducted at the Metabolic and Atherosclerosis Research Center in Cincinnati, Ohio, Dr. Jonathan Isaacsohn and others measured CRP levels in nearly 350 patients enrolled in two studies of simvastatin. In the first, 130 patients with high levels of blood fats were given 40 milligrams (mg) or 80 mg of simvastatin or an inactive placebo for 6 weeks. In the second trial, patients with high levels of fats called triglycerides were given simvastatin at 20 mg, 40 mg or 80 mg for 6 weeks.
Isaacsohn reported that simvastatin 20 mg reduced CRP levels by 4.4%, the 40-mg dose lowered CRP levels 23.1%, and simvastatin 80 mg lowered CRP levels by 22%.
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