STATIN RESISTANT
ANCHOR LEAD: THERE MAY SOON BE AN ALTERNATIVE TO STATIN MEDICATIONS FOR LOWERING CHOLESTEROL, ELIZABETH TRACEY REPORTS
Eprotirome is the generic name for a medication being used to lower cholesterol levels by a different mechanism than statins do. Paul Ladenson, study leader at Johns Hopkins, says there are many people who can’t take statins because of side effects or who simply don’t respond to them very well.
LADENSON: In this study we looked at a group of approximately a hundred patients who had already been on statin therapy to lower cholesterol but had not achieved the targeted degree of cholesterol lowering. There was a very substantial lowering of LDL cholesterol when patients were begun on eproterone and there was a dose related decline. :26
Ladenson says the medication may also be helpful in people who have elevated triglyceride levels. The study was published in the March 11, 2010 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.
