NYMC Faculty Publications
Treatment of Hypercholesterolemia in 2015
DOI
10.1097/MJT.0000000000000358
Journal Title
American Journal of Therapeutics
First Page
e121
Last Page
e129
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
3-1-2017
Department
Medicine
Abstract
Randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled secondary prevention and primary prevention studies and observational studies have documented that statins reduce cardiovascular events in high-risk patients with hypercholesterolemia. The 2013 American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association guidelines on treatment of hypercholesterolemia support the use of statins in 4 major groups that will be discussed. The Expert Panel of these guidelines could find no data supporting the routine use of nonstatin drugs combined with statins to further reduce cardiovascular events. Since these guidelines were published, a double-blind randomized trial of 18,144 patients with an acute coronary syndrome demonstrated at a 7-year follow-up that the incidence of cardiovascular events was 34.7% in patients randomized to simvastatin plus placebo versus 32.7% in patients randomized to simvastatin plus ezetimibe (hazard ratio = 0.936; P = 0.016). Proprotein convertase subtilisin/kexin type 9 inhibitors further lower serum low-density lipoprotein cholesterol by 50%-70% in patients treated with statins and 4 phase 3 trials including more than 70,000 patients are investigating whether these monoclonal antibodies to proprotein convertase subtilisin/kexin type 9 will lower cardiovascular events.
Recommended Citation
Aronow, W. S. (2017). Treatment of Hypercholesterolemia in 2015. American Journal of Therapeutics, 24 (2), e121-e129. https://doi.org/10.1097/MJT.0000000000000358