July 8th, 2011
Podcast 125: The smoking-cessation drug varenicline poses some difficult tradeoffs.
There is a new meta-analysis from the Canadian Medical Association Journal that finds increased risks among smokers trying to quit and taking varenicline (Chantix). Among smokers with stable cardiovascular disease, the number needed to treat to cause an adverse cardiovascular event is about 30, yet the number needed to treat to achieve smoking cessation is 10. […]
May 14th, 2011
Podcast 121: NSAIDs Unsafe at Any Dose after MI
Guidelines warn about using NSAIDs after myocardial infarction, and a 10-year look-back study from Denmark shows that the warning should be even louder. Whereas current AHA guidelines advise using NSAIDs after MI for the briefest possible time, the Danish study, published last week in Circulation, finds that the risks for death and reinfarction begin within […]
May 6th, 2011
Podcast 120: Pass the salt!
European researchers say they’ve got the data to show that restricting salt in the general population is a bad mistake. By implication, the U.S. dietary salt guidelines are plainly wrong. How did they do this? They followed 3700 subjects for roughly 8 years, having first measured their 24-hour urinary sodium excretion. Their data show that lower […]
April 22nd, 2011
Podcast 119: Calcium supplements and risk
Most clinicians, when asked, say they will routinely recommend calcium supplements for their postmenopausal patients. A meta-analysis from BMJ shows that this well-intentioned advice seems to lead to a moderate increase in cardiovascular risk in these women. We talk with Prof. Ian Reid, whose re-analysis of Women’s Health Initiative data confirms earlier work he’d done. Listen in. […]
October 1st, 2010
Podcast 103: eGFR and cardiovascular risk assessment
Welcome back. We take a look this week at a study from Iceland that looks at whether estimated glomerular filtration rates have a role in estimating cardiovascular risk. Our interview is with Cambridge University’s Dr. Emanuele Di Angelantonio. Your comments are welcome, both here and to my email address: jelia@jwatch.org. Interview-related links: BMJ study (free) BMJ meta-analysis (free) […]
July 1st, 2010
Podcast 94: What does a new meta-analysis tell us about statins and primary prevention?
A meta-analysis of 11 studies encompassing more than 60,000 subjects finds that statins don’t lower all-cause mortality in people without cardiovascular disease. One editorialist calls the study, just published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, “the cleanest and most complete meta-analysis of pharmacological lipid lowering for primary prevention.” One of the study’s principal authors, Kausik K. […]
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