2008-03-31

What is the evidence?

This recent announcement of the lack of efficacy of a widely prescribed "cholesterol lowering" combination (two drugs) agent should give us pause. Those of us who practice medicine know all too well how much of what we do is art and not science. Despite billions of dollars of research that linked blood biomarkers such as LDL and CRP to heart disease, we now have a well-run trial that seems to show that the lowering of these "bad" biomarkers does not affect thickening of the walls of arteries in a manner previously thought to result in disease. This once again points to the importance of unimpeachable curation of medical evidence and its clear and untrammeled communication to patients and providers alike.



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