CardioExchange Archive

Enrollment in Eplerenone Trial Stopped Early: The Data Safety Monitoring Committee has ended enrollment in the EMPHASIS-HF trial after determining that the trial had met its primary efficacy endpoint. According to a press release issued by Pfizer, the trial was testing eplerenone versus placebo in patients with established mild-to-moderate heart failure who were also at risk for sudden death. The primary endpoint was the first occurrence of either cardiovascular death or heart failure hospitalization. It had been anticipated that the trial would last until 2011.

Aspirin Recommended for Primary Prevention in High-Risk Diabetics: In a joint statement from the American College of Cardiology Foundation, the American Diabetes Association, and the American Heart Association, low-dose aspirin is deemed “a reasonable measure” to prevent a first cardiovascular event in diabetics who also have a high risk for heart disease. “Because the relative risk reduction appears to be modest, the panel felt that we are on strongest ground recommending aspirin for those at increased cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk, defined by the age categories and risk factors mentioned or by a calculation of CVD risk,” said the lead author of the statement, Michael Pignone, in an AHA press release.

Transcranial Doppler Stratifies Risk in Asymptomatic Carotid Stenosis: People with asymptomatic carotid stenosis of at least 70% who had embolic signals on transcranial doppler (TCD) were two and a half times more likely to have an ipsilateral stroke or TIA than those without embolic signals, according to results of the Asymptomatic Carotid Emboli Study (ACES) presented at the European Stroke Conference in Barcelona and published online in Lancet Neurology. The authors concluded that “ACES shows that detection of embolic signals by TCD can identify groups of patients with asymptomatic carotid stenosis who are at low or high risk of future stroke. This technique might be a useful risk predictor for identifying those patients who might benefit from intervention with carotid endarterectomy.”