Thursday, September 17th 2009

By selma al-samarrai

McMaster University boasted three studies regarding cardiology medicine at this year’s European Society of Cardiology Congress in Barcelona, Spain. The three university-led studies were presented individually by different professors from McMaster.

The first presentation was by Stuart Connolly, a professor of medicine at the Michael G. Degroote School of Medicine and a member of the Population Health Research Institute at McMaster University and Hamilton Health Sciences. Connolly’s research included creating the blood-thinning drug Dabigatran. Until the creation of Dabigatran, Warfarin has been the standard medicine used to reduce strokes in patients. According to Connolly, problems associated with Warfarin include the requirement of monthly blood tests to monitor Warfarin intake and the possibility of hemorrhaging, which exists with any blood-thinners. The creation of Dabigatran has been a major milestone for stroke research due to its several facets of improvement. One being that it is an oral medicine, which does not require a monthly blood test and it reduces the possibility of a stroke and reduces the possibility of a hemorrhage.

Connolly explained that the study started about three years ago and has since gathered the participation of 18,000 patients across 44 countries. “Well I think that this really a breakthrough and that this drug is going to come out in the market in Canada and most other countries probably in a year or a year and a half, and when it does, it’s going to be really a lot better for people… and the study was run here and analyzed here, so everyone at McMaster should be proud of what happened.”

Another McMaster-directed study which was presented at the European Society of Cardiology Congress is led by Shamir Mehta, an associate professor of medicine in the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine and a member of the Population Health Research Institute. The study, known as the CURRENT-OASIS-7, compared the effects of two different doses of clopidogrel and aspirin in patients who have acute coronary syndrome and angioplasty. Mehta explained that “[patients] were randomized to receive either a double dose of clopidogrel, which is the standard blood thinner, or the standard dose. And there was a second randomization to higher doses of aspirin vs. lower doses of aspirin”. 25,000 patients from 39 countries in 700 hospitals were enrolled in the study, making this the largest clinical trial of this patient population.

Results showed that the double dose of clopidogrel was more effective than the single dose, and, despite an increase of bleeding, there was no fatal bleeding or bleeding of the brain. The higher dose of aspirin was no more effective than the lower dose, but there was no increase in bleeding when using the higher dose, which Mehta stated was “an important finding because people commonly held the belief that higher doses of aspirin increase bleeding.”

The last study presented at the Cardiology Congress, referred to as the ACTIVE-1 study, was led by Salim Yusuf, director of the Population Health Research Institute and chair of the ACTIVE-1 steering committee. The ACTIVE-1 study examined the effects of the hypertension drug irbesartan in regards to heart failure complications and mini-strokes. The study found that irbesartan reduced both the heart failure complications, mini-strokes, and blood vessel blockage.

All three studies were conducted independently by the Population Health Research Institute.