New life-saving heart attack medication ...( g only captopril. In addition to their...),Health

The researchers used a proven dose of captopril (a dose based on the acclaimed SAVE trial) as the comparator. Based on data drawn from 931 centers in 24 different countries, the comparative analysis showed that valsartan was as good as captopril in reducing the risk of death and other major cardiovascular events. Patients taking both medications in combination, however, experienced a greater number of drug-related adverse events. This finding led Dr. Pfeffer, VALIANT principal investigator and a professor at Harvard Medical School, to suggest that combining therapies offered no additional benefits. Both ACE inhibitors and ARBs are involved in blocking the same biochemical pathway that is responsible for producing the hormone, angiotensin II. This hormone has deleterious effects on the heart and blood vessels, often prompting adverse cardiac events, such as high blood pressure and heart failure. ARBs block or prevent angiotensin II from clinging to the receptors of cells. ACE inhibitors on the other hand act to block an enzyme that produces angiotensin.

Preliminary research into ACE inhibitors was first conducted at BWH under the leadership of Dr. Pfeffer and his late wife Janice Pfeffer, who first discovered the hormone's role in preserving heart function in animals. Building off of his wife's laboratory discovery, in 1992 Dr. Pfeffer and Eugene Braunwald, MD published the first human study to show that ACE inhibitors were effective in improving the survival of heart attack patients. The hallmark trial, known as SAVE, is credited with revolutionizing post-heart attack care when it introduced the drug captopril as a new life-saving treatment option for patients. The data showed captopril could cut the risk of recurrent heart attack by 25 per
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10-Nov-2003