ACE Inhibitor Drugs

ACE inhibitors are a class of drugs called "angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors."  This class of drug has been around for years and is used to treat patients with heart failure as well as hypertension. The new study had some interesting findings for the two types of patients studied, those with:

• vascular disease or
• diabetes mellitus and one or more risk factors (high blood pressure, high cholesterol, or smoking) for vascular disease.

Research studies have shown that patients who took an ACE Inhibitor as opposed to placebo had:

• a 25% lower risk of death from heart disease,
• a 20% lower risk of death from heart attack,
• a 30% lower risk of death from stroke,
• a 16% lower rate of heart surgery or re-vascularization procedures, and
• a 30% lower risk of developing diabetes.

 

What do the study results mean for me?
If you currently have vascular (blood vessel) disease and you are taking an ACE inhibitor, your doctor may suggest changing your medication to the exact drug that was studied. If you have diabetes mellitus and one or more risk factors for heart disease, including high blood pressure, high cholesterol level, or smoking, your doctor may suggest you start taking one of the ACE inhibitor drugs.

If you are taking an ACE-inhibitor drug, pay careful attention to the side effects your medication might cause and tell your doctor promptly about any changes in how you are feeling.

The results of this study will likely change how many patients are treated. In fact, if the treatments that seem most beneficial as a result of this study were put into effect world-wide, more than two million major cardiovascular events or diabetic events might be avoided. Nevertheless, this treatment is new, and your doctor needs to evaluate if it might work for you.

If you have a question about the information presented, you may write to:

"Ask the Doctor"
PO Box 9190
Pittsburgh, PA 15224