Treating Heart Attacks With Prescription Drugs Alone as Effective as Using Stents, Less Costly, Study Finds
Treating some heart attacks with drugs alone is less costly and as effective as using stents, according to a study published Thursday in the New England Journal of Medicine, the Raleigh News & Observer reports. For the study, researchers from Duke University followed a subset of 2,100 people who participated in a previous study that found clot-busting drugs alone provided as much benefit to many heart attack patients as stents and drugs together.
According to the latest study, stents are no more effective than drugs alone if the heart attack occurred a day or more before the patient sought treatment. The study found that patients who received stents stayed in hospitals 1.2 days longer than those who received medication. The average cost of care for stent patients during the first 30 days of treatment was $22,859, compared with $12,683 for those using only medication, according to the study. The cost difference narrowed after two years, but patients using medication alone saved $7,000 on average. According to the study, an estimated 100,000 heart attack patients in the U.S. do not need stents, which could translate to savings of $700 million.
Joel Miller, senior vice president for operations at the National Coalition on Health Care, said the study is a "case in point" of why physicians and patients need better data. He said, "We need to put more resources into research to know what works and doesn't work for [the] same medical conditions." According to the News & Observer, the new economic stimulus plan includes more than $1 billion "to enhance the science behind medical practices, which often favor technology and high-priced interventions over less-expensive approaches such as drugs, even though the health benefits are unknown or dubious" (Avery, Raleigh News & Observer, 2/19).
"CBS Evening News with Katie Couric" on Wednesday reported on the study. The segment included comments from Steve Nissen of the Cleveland Clinic and Ralph Brindis of the American College of Cardiology (LaPook, "CBS Evening News with Katie Couric," CBS, 2/18).
An abstract of the study is available online.
