The New Philipics

Ezetimibe, Statins, and Heart Disease Headlines are filled today with news that a popular combination of drugs for lowering cholesterol levels is no better than the older of the two drugs alone (c.f. “Trial: Popular cholesterol drug fails to improve heart disease” CNN, http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/03/30/cholesterol.drug.ap/index.html ). Cholesterol and the mechanisms for lowering it are subjects with which I am not unfamiliar. This conclusion comes from the so-called ENHANCE trial of vytorin vs simvastatin [An aside, in clinical trials, especially those related to cardiovascular disease, there is a tradition of clever names from tortured acronyms and this one is one of the more tortured: Ezetimibe and Simvastatin in Hypercholesterolemia Enhances Atherosclerosis Regression – you figure out how this is an acronym] suggests that the combination therapy is no better than the statin alone. So, if one is taking the combination (sold as Vytorin), as I am doing, should one...