CardioExchange Archive

New Approach to Statin Therapy: Tailoring statin therapy based on individual risk is more effective and efficient than the treat-to-target approach  adopted by NCEP III, according to a new report in Annals of Internal Medicine by Rodney Hayward and colleagues (including CardioExchange’s Editor Harlan Krumholz). Using data from statin trials and national data on CAD risk factors, the authors concluded that “a tailored treatment strategy prevents more CAD events while treating fewer persons with high-dose statins than low-density lipoprotein cholesterol–based target approaches. Results were robust, even with assumptions favoring a treat-to-target approach.”

ED and CVD: Erectile dysfunction is closely tied to cardiovascular disease but does not improve prognostic power beyond traditional risk factors, according to a study from the prospective Massachusetts Male Aging Study by Andre Araujo and colleagues in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

Unnecessary Stents: The hospital with the biggest cardiac catheterization laboratory in Maryland, St. Joseph Medical Center in the community of Towson, has told 369 of its heart patients that they may have received a stent unnecessarily,  according to a story in the Baltimore Sun.