RICHMOND, Va. (March 2, 2007) Erectile dysfunction drugs may be better than nitroglycerin in protecting the heart from damage before and after a severe heart attack, Virginia Commonwealth University researchers report today.
During a heart attack, the heart is deprived of oxygen, which can result in significant damage to heart muscle and tissue. After the attack, most patients require treatment to reduce and repair the damage and improve their chances of survival. With the exception of early reperfusion, there are no available therapies that are truly effective in protecting or repairing such damage clinically.
Rakesh C. Kukreja, Ph.D., professor of medicine and Eric Lipman Chair of Cardiology at VCU, and colleagues compared nitroglycerin with two erectile dysfunction drugs -- Viagra, generically known as sildenafil, and Levitra, generically known as vardenafil -- to determine the effectiveness of each for heart protection following a heart attack. Nitroglycerin is a drug used to treat angina, or chest pain. It is a vasodilator and opens blood vessels in order to improve the flow of blood to a patient's heart.
The research team reported that in an animal model, sildenafil and vardenafil reduce damage in the heart muscle when given after a severe heart attack. In contrast, nitroglycerin failed to reduce the damage in the heart when administered under similar conditions. The findings were published in the February issue of the Journal of Molecular and Cellular Cardiology, the official publication of the International Society for Heart Research.
"Erectile dysfunction drugs can prevent damage in the heart not only when given before a heart attack, as we discovered previously, but also lessen the injury after the heart attack," said Kukreja, who is the lead author of the study.
According to Kukreja, the protective effects on the heart produced by these erectile dysfunction drugs may be potentially useful as adjunct th
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Contact: Sathya Achia-Abraham
sbachia@vcu.edu
804-827-0890
Virginia Commonwealth University
2-Mar-2007