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Posts Tagged ‘statins’

ACC/AHA Cholesterol guidelines 2013 : An one minute extract !

Posted in Cardiology -guidelines, cardiology -Preventive, Cardiology -Therapeutic dilemma, cardiology -Therapeutics, Cardiology -unresolved questions, Cardiology lipids /dyslipidemia, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 14, 2014| Leave a Comment »

I share my thoughts after going through this  85 page  land mark document !

acc aha 2013 guidelines cholesterol ncep

In whatever way I look at it  ,It  keeps  both physicians and their patient population guessing  in a  confused sate regarding their cholesterol levels  the treatment modalities !

It seems to revolve around a single point agenda,  how to fit a single drug called statin in the scheme of things !

What  if  ,  a new  drug comes and statin is  proved  not an angel  in our fight against the evil  of  atheroscerosis !

 

acc aha lipid guidelines atp 3 ncep nhlbi dyslipidemia

Summary as  I interpreted

“All healthy and unhealthy human beings should ask only one  question

whether they can some how  benefit from taking statins  ? “

If your answer is yes ,  administer the statin  not in  low dose but in moderately high dose ! (It  appears  there is little role for low intensity statins )

There  is generally no  need to to monitor the lipid levels as long as patient is comfortable.

Disclaimer :  *Sorry , the Intention is not to  hurt the hard work of a elite panel who toiled for years to bring this much awaited guidelines on lipids and atherosclerosis! but to express my view , biased though !)

A mini research

To confirm my assumption I did a curious word search in this 85  page document .

For words statin , diet and exercise

  1. Statin appeared  814 times
  2. Diet appeared 8 times
  3. and exercise just once in the entire document !

statin search acc document statin acc aha 2013 guidelines statin acc aha 2013 guidelines 2

The importance of  diet and  body activity  which  are  the  primary   determinant of serum lipid levels is mentioned  in a cursory fashion in this  global guideline meant to control the total  cholesterol load  and atherosclerosis of our population .

Meanwhile . a drug which  acts in a  physiological  cell servicing  metabolic path way in a complex fashion  is glorified 814  times !Do  you still  think this post is is biased ?

 

 

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What is the real impact of statins on HDL levels ?

Posted in cardiology -Therapeutics, Cardiology -unresolved questions, tagged , , , , , , , , on August 16, 2009| 1 Comment »

10.14prescriptionRXStatins are projected to be  the saviours of human race against the  killer atherosclerosis .Now we have reached a stage  soon ,  where every healthy individual may be administered this drug. There are consistent evidence for statins to reduce , retard , prevent progression of existing atheroscelorosis  and possibly prevent future atherosclerosis.

This  wonder drug acts by blocking the HMG COA enzyme a vital  enzyme that regulates the lipid metabolism within the cells. It is made to appear  as if ,  the  God has  created this enzyme  with the only purpose for human suffering , by blocking this   we  expect  all errors in lipid  metabolism is corrected.

This enzyme is  part of the house keeping  system  that is meant to service the human cellular lipid layers 24hrs a day. If it  is impaired intentionally one can imagine the consequences. That’s what modern science is all about. Luckily God is kind enough the side effects of  blocking this enzyme is seen only in minority. The myopathies that are classically described with statins are due to possible mitochondrial dysfunction .

As the debate still  continues to find the   optimal bottom levels  of LDL  , we have more worries ,  real world experiences have brought us a new issue  namely  the  reduction of HDL with statins. While literature search on statins and HDL  tell  us there is marginal increase in HDL up to 10% the fact is there is marginal fall or significant  fall in many of the patients .

How can this happen ? A  huge difference between real world and trial world ?

statins hdl ldl

* Brands shown  not intentional

Readers are welcome to add their input on this question .

Reference

Visit HDL forum

http://www.hdlforum.org/

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Top ten inventions and concepts in cardiology

Posted in Cardiology - Clinical, Cardiology - Electrophysiology -Pacemaker, cardiology-ethics, Hemodynamics, Top ten in cardiology, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on December 24, 2008| 1 Comment »

 Selected on the basis of ,  impact  on survival , relief of  human suffering index and also innovation

10.Percuateneous interventions

9.  Electrocardiography

8 . Hemodynamics of cardiovascular system

7.Fruesemide

6.Thrombolysis

5.Pacemakers

4.Defibrillation

3.Heparin

2.Prosthetic valves

1.Coronary care units

 

Waiting list

Concept of vascular biology

Statins

RF ablation

Nitric oxide

Total Artifitial heart

Echocardiography

 

Ten least important concepts and  inventions in cardiology

Selected based on duplication of research, futile scientific concepts and   of course impact on survival

10.Low molecular weight heparins

9.Cardiac resynchronisation

8.Rotablator

7.Multi  chamber pacing

6.Newer ARBs

5.C reactive protein

4.Three dimensional echocardiography

3.

Comments welcome  and please contibute

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Guideline violations in cardiology practice : Every body does it , so do I !

Posted in Cardiology -Interventional -PCI, cardiology- coronary care, cardiology-ethics, tagged , , , , , , , , , on August 24, 2008| Leave a Comment »

All is not well,  that ends well !

                                       Treatment guidelines in cardiology  practice  are periodically published by ACC/AHA/ESC.These guidelines  represent the current scientific practice. They are called some times as recommendations. Medical professionals tend to adhere to this guidelines whenever possible.They are not legally binding in most of the countries.In USA some states believe it, to be legally binding.

 

The problem with these guidelines  are , they are classified as class 1 ,class 2 , class 3 recommendations.

 

Class 1, A  drug , device  or a procedure  Is definitely useful and must be prescribed.

Class 3,   A  drug , device  or a procedure  Is not useful and should not be used .

Class 2*, A  drug , device  or a procedure  may be useful  or may be harmful , and hence may be used or may not be used . (Vaguest possible guideline!)

 *Altered to convey the meaning

What are the  guideline violations that can be sued in court of law  ?

A person with established  CAD who is not been prescribed a  statin (Cholesterol lowering drug)  can be sued straight away,  even if the patient has no adverse outcome due to the nonprescription of that drug. The issue here is , the doctor  has not prescribed  a drug which has  proven benefit .The law is clear on that .Most will  agree that,  the  doctor is at fault ,  and he  is never protected  even by their  colleagues .He  can’t defend his action.

What are the medical errors that can never* be sued in court of law !

But the same doctor who opens up a totally occluding coronary artery in an asymptomatic patient(CTO -chronic total occlusion) and lands up  in a complication and the  patient dies. This could be  major guideline violation as opening a CTO in an incidentally detected , asymptomatic patient is a class 3 recommendation. Neither the physician, patient , institution  nor  the regulatory authorities bother about this even though there is strong case for censure , in reality it never happens. Number  of  experts from leading hospitals do this procedure in live work shop all over the world with full media glare, It is an irony the same  experts are only  writing  in their  guidelines  that  these procedures should not be done inappropriately.

And this medical  error ( Should we call it a  crime if it is knowingly done ! )   keeps growing as the physician never feels guilty about it .

The message here is

 A physician of a state of the art hospital,  in a scientifically advanced  country  goes scott free and guilt free  even if he openly violate the scientific guidelines and do a inappropriate procedure that result in a patient death. Mean while a small time physician in a remote place in the same country can be taken to task  for not prescribing a officially  recommended drug (By standard guidelines) .He will be labelled unscientific and unethical even if his non prescription , had not caused any untoward health outcome .

In short , in today’s modern medical practice 

 Even a  ” Minor error of  ommision”   attracts guilt and perceived fear among the physicians. Meanwhile  many  of the ” Major errors of commission”  done by professionals are rarely frowned upon and thus these  mistakes continue to perpetuate !

*There should be a strong provision in medical law to address the issue of inappropriate procedures even if the procedure has not resulted any untoward effect to the patient.

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Is pulmonary artery atherosclerosis possible ? Are we under diagnosing it ?

Posted in Infrequently asked questions in cardiology (iFAQs), Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on July 26, 2008| 1 Comment »

Atherosclerosis is  the number one killer of mankind  .It involves all medium and large sized blood vessels.Any intima and media can be invaded by the disese process.Most common to involve are  cerebral, carotid, coronary, aortic  and it’s branches, renal, and peripheral arteries. But how pulmonary artery is missing in this list ? Is it really true (or) are we missing it ? One logical explanation is pulmonary circulation is a low pressure circulation and the maximum presssure is less than  30mmhg . This pressure may be insufficient to induce endothelial injury that predispose lipid mediated injury.

Other explanation could be a structural difference in the media and intima compared to aorta .But in patients  with primary or secondary pulmonary hypertension where,   inspite of PA pressure being high ,  still atherosclerotic changes is very uncommon . or Is it the Heath Edwards pulmonary vascular sclerosis  grading  reflects nothing but pulmonary atherosclero-thrombosis !

If this is true there could be a major role for HMG Coa reductase inhibitors in altering the natural course of pulmonary obstructive vascular  disese . Statins might be tried in PPH  a disese with no specific  treatment !

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