Larry Husten, PHD
January 8th, 2010
Friday Roundup: IMPROVE-IT Pushed Back, Statins not Beneficial for AS, Xience V Approved in Japan, New Format for Scientific Papers
Larry Husten, PHD
The much-discussed IMPROVE-IT trial comparing the combination of ezetimibe and simvastatin with simvastatin monotherapy in 18,000 patients won’t be completed until June 2013, a year later than previously announced. (Merck press release and FAQ) Another trial has found that statin therapy, this time using rosuvastatin 40 mg, was not beneficial in aortic stenosis. ASTRONOMER was […]
January 7th, 2010
Thursday Roundup: COMPARE in the Lancet, Nebivolol for HF gets a rough FDA review, Phentermine/topiramate reduces sleep apnea in small study
Larry Husten, PHD
The COMPARE trial, published online in the Lancet, found that everolimus-eluting stents outperformed paclitaxel-eluting stents. The COMPARE investigators “suggest that paclitaxel-eluting stents should no longer be used in everyday clinical practice.” CardioBrief has an interesting comment from David Kandzari.The FDA released briefing documents for Monday’s Cardiovascular and Renal Drugs Advisory Committee meeting to review a […]
January 6th, 2010
Wednesday News Roundup: FDA to Reevaluate ESAs, Aspirin Underuse in REACH, & more…
Larry Husten, PHD
In an NEJM perspective, four FDA officials review the sorry history of erythropoiesis-stimulating agents (ESAs) and call for randomized trials to establish “the optimal hemoglobin target, dosing algorithm, and monitoring approach” for these drugs. They also announce that the FDA intends to convene an advisory panel in 2010 “to reevaluate the use of ESAs in the […]
January 5th, 2010
Tuesday News Roundup: Catheter Ablation of VT, TRITON-TIMI 38 Substudy, Benefits of Exercise, & More
Larry Husten, PHD
The VTACH trial of catheter ablation of VT prior to ICD implantation has been published in the Lancet. You can find summaries of the trial at Cardiosource, TheHeart.Org and MedPage Today. The TRITON-TIMI 38 cost-effectiveness substudy of prasugrel vs. clopidogrel in ACS patients appears in Circulation. Lilly also issued a press release. Two articles in the Wall Street Journal focus on the […]
January 4th, 2010
Braunwald Guides New Conflict-of-Interest Policy at Partners
Larry Husten, PHD
At the start of the year a far more stringent conflict-of-interest policy went into effect at Massachusetts General and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, according to a story in the New York Times. The new policy limits pay for top officials who serve as outside directors for companies and forbids any employee from accepting speaking fees […]
January 2nd, 2010
Israeli Cardiologists Withdraw from ISCHEMIA
Larry Husten, PHD
Israeli cardiologists have decided they won’t participate in the ISCHEMIA trial, the planned NIH-funded follow-up to COURAGE. Click here to read an article in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, or additional coverage on CardioBrief.
December 16th, 2009
FDA Advisers Recommend Expanding Crestor to Patients Without High Cholesterol
Larry Husten, PHD
An FDA advisory panel voted 12 to 4 on Tuesday to expand the use of rosuvastatin (Crestor) to patients with normal cholesterol levels and no history of cardiac disease, according to the Associated Press. The panel’s recommendation was based on last year’s JUPITER trial, in which rosuvastatin cut cardiovascular risk in patients with normal LDL […]
December 4th, 2009
The Final CMS Rule Is Flawed
vincentjbufalino and Larry Husten, PHD
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Final Rule on the cardiology fee schedule (download the entire 450-page document here) is an ill-conceived policy change that will drastically affect the practice of cardiology in the United States. Relying on limited, unrepresentative data from the Physician Practice Information survey (PPIS) done by the AMA, the CMS determined that […]
November 30th, 2009
Even Very Low Levels of Cardiac Troponin T Linked to Heart Failure, Cardiovascular Death
Larry Husten, PHD
Even very low levels of cardiac troponin T are associated with increased risk for heart failure and cardiovascular death among patients with stable heart disease, according to an industry-funded study in the New England Journal of Medicine. Using a highly sensitive assay, researchers tested for troponin T in nearly 3700 adults with stable coronary artery […]
November 24th, 2009
Pharmacist-Physician Collaboration Could Reduce BP in Hypertensive Patients
Larry Husten, PHD
A pharmacist-physician team approach to managing hypertension is “highly effective,” reports Archives of Internal Medicine. Six community-based, family medicine residency clinics were randomized to be either intervention or control sites (some 400 patients with uncontrolled hypertension were enrolled). In the intervention group, clinical pharmacists were encouraged to assess patients’ medication and blood pressure routinely, and […]
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