Tailored Drug Protects Heart Attack Patients

Giving a special version of the blood thinner heparin in the hours after a heart attack can reduce the death rate and the incidence of a later heart attack, new Canadian research shows. The study of more than 15,500 patients treated at hospitals in India and China found the 30-day death rate for heart attack patients given the drug reviparin was 13 percent lower than for patients who did not get the drug. The incidence of second heart attacks was 23 percent lower in the patients who got reviparin, the study found. Equally significant was the finding that the incidence of stroke was not increased by use of the drug. The research, carried out by scientists at McMaster University in Hamilton, is published in the Jan. 26 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.