The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) will hold a press conference at 9:30 a.m. on December 17 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., to release the results of the Antihypertensive and Lipid-Lowering Treatment to Prevent Heart Attack Trial (ALLHAT).

ALLHAT is the largest high blood pressure clinical trial ever conducted. The long-term, multi-center trial compared drugs for use in starting treatment for high blood pressure and included a cholesterol-lowering study that compared the effects of a statin drug with "usual care."

Press conference speakers will be:

Claude Lenfant, M.D., Director of the NHLBI, Bethesda, MD

Barry Davis, M.D., Ph.D., Director and Principal Investigator of the ALLHAT Clinical Trials Center, Professor of Biometry, University of Texas School of Public Health, Houston, TX

Curt Furberg, M.D., Chair of the ALLHAT Steering Committee, Professor of Public Health Sciences, Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center, Winston-Salem, NC

Jackson Wright, M.D., Ph.D., Vice Chair of the ALLHAT Steering Committee, Professor of Medicine, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH

Jeffrey Probstfield, M.D., Member of the ALLHAT Steering Committee, Director, Clinical Trials Service Unit, Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology, University of Washington Health Sciences Center, Seattle, WA

Paul Whelton, M.D., Member of the ALLHAT Steering Committee, Professor of Epidemiology and Medicine, Tulane University Health Sciences Center, New Orleans, LA

The press conference will be held in the Ballroom of the National Press Club, 529 14th St., N.W., 13th floor, Washington, D.C. 20045. For directions, go to: http://npc.press.org/abouttheclub/maps.shtml.

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Contact: NHLBI Communications Office
301-496-4236
NIH/National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
17-Dec-2002