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- Fellström, Bengt, et al.
(författare)
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Effect of fluvastatin on renal end points in the Assessment of Lescol in Renal Transplant (ALERT) trial
- 2004
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Ingår i: Kidney International. - : Elsevier BV. - 0085-2538 .- 1523-1755. ; 66:4, s. 1549-1555
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- BACKGROUND: Hyperlipidemia is a risk factor for long-term renal transplant dysfunction, but no prospective clinical trials have investigated the effects of statin treatment on graft function in renal transplant recipients. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the effect of fluvastatin on long-term renal transplant function and development of chronic allograft nephropathy in the ALERT (Assessment of Lescol in Renal Transplantation) study. METHODS: ALERT was a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study of the effect of fluvastatin, 40 mg and 80 mg daily, in renal transplant recipients. Patients were randomized to receive either fluvastatin (N= 1050) or placebo (N= 1052) and followed for five to six years. Renal end points included graft loss or doubling of serum creatinine or death; glomerular filtration rate (GFR) was also measured during follow-up in a subset of patients (N= 439). RESULTS: There were 283 patients (13.5%) with graft loss, mainly due to chronic rejection (82%), yielding an annual rate of 2.4%. Fluvastatin treatment significantly lowered mean low-density lipoprotein (LDL)-cholesterol levels by 32% (95% CI -33 to -30) compared with placebo, but had no significant effect on the incidence of renal graft loss or doubling of serum creatinine, or decline in GFR throughout follow-up in the whole study population. Neither was any treatment effect by fluvastatin found in any of the subgroups analyzed. CONCLUSION: Fluvastatin treatment significantly improves lipid values in renal transplant recipients but has no effect on graft loss or doubling of serum creatinine.
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- Holdaas, H., et al.
(författare)
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Effect of fluvastatin on cardiac outcomes in renal transplant recipients : A multicentre, randomised, placebo-controlled trial
- 2003
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Ingår i: The Lancet. - 0140-6736 .- 1474-547X. ; 361:9374, s. 2024-2031
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Renal transplant recipients are at increased risk of premature cardiovascular disease. Although statins reduce cardiovascular risk in the general population, their efficacy and safety in renal transplant recipients have not been established. We investigated the effects of fluvastatin on cardiac and renal endpoints in this population. Methods: We did a multicentre, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial in 2102 renal transplant recipients with total cholesterol 4·0-9·0 mmol/L. We randomly assigned patients fluvastatin (n=1050) or placebo (n=1052) and follow up was for 5-6 years. The primary endpoint was the occurrence of a major adverse cardiac event, defined as cardiac death, non-fatal myocardial infarction (MI), or coronary intervention procedure. Secondary endpoints were individual cardiac events, combined cardiac death or non-fatal MI, cerebrovascular events, non-cardiovascular death, all-cause mortality, and graft loss or doubling of serum creatinine. Analysis was by intention to treat. Findings: After a mean follow-up of 5·1 years, fluvastatin lowered LDL cholesterol concentrations by 32%. Risk reduction with fluvastatin for the primary endpoint (risk ratio 0·83 [95% CI 0·64-1·06], p=0·139) was not significant, although there were fewer cardiac deaths or non-fatal MI (70 vs 104, 0·65 [0·48-0·88] p=0·005) in the fluvastatin group than in the placebo group. Coronary intervention procedures and other secondary endpoints did not differ significantly between groups. Interpretation: Although cardiac deaths and non-fatal MI seemed to be reduced, fluvastatin did not generally reduce rates of coronary intervention procedures or mortality. Overall effects of fluvastatin were similar to those of statins in other populations.
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- Olsson, Anders, 1940-, et al.
(författare)
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Are early clinical effects of cholesterol lowering mediated through effects on inflammation?
- 2002
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Ingår i: Acta Physiologica Scandinavica. - 0001-6772 .- 1365-201X. ; 176:2, s. 147-150
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In a randomized, double-blind trial in 3086 patients with unstable angina pectoris or non-Q wave myocardial infarction we investigated if 80 mg of atorvastatin daily could improve outcome of cardiovascular events during a short period of time (16 weeks) compared with placebo. Baseline LDL cholesterol was 3.2 mmol L-1 (124 mg dL-1) and decreased by 40% to 1.9 mmol L-1 (72 mg dL-1) during atorvastatin treatment. The primary endpoint, which was a composite of death, non-fatal acute myocardial infarction, cardiac arrest with resuscitation or recurrent symptomatic myocardial ischaemia with objective evidence and requiring emergency rehospitalization occurred in 228 patients (14.8%) in the atorvastatin group and 269 patients (17.4%) in the placebo group. The relative risk was 0.84 and 95% confidence interval was 0.70-1.00 (P = 0.048). Thus for patients with acute coronary syndromes, lipid-lowering therapy with high dose atorvastatin reduces recurrent ischaemic events in the short-term. A possible mechanism behind this rapid clinical effect induced by statin treatment is on inflammatory processes. Recent studies strongly suggest that acute T-cell activation is involved in the pathogenesis of unstable angina. In another study we investigated whether circulating T cells showed signs of activation in patients with stable angina pectoris (SA). Systemic venous blood samples were taken from 38 men with SA and 42 healthy controls. The T-cell receptor expression was assessed by three-colour flow cytometry using monoclonal antibodies against CD3, CD4, CD8, CD25 and human leucocyte antigen (HLA)-DR. Soluble interleukin-2 receptor (sIL-2R) was measured as the circulating form in serum. Levels of circulating CD3+ and CD4+ T cells tended to be higher in patients compared with controls. Patients were also shown to have a significant increase in CD4+ T cells expressing the activation markers CD25 (P < 0.05) and HLA-DR (P < 0.01). Furthermore, serum levels of sIL-2R were significantly higher (P < 0.001) in patients than in controls. We also observed that the T-cell response was more pronounced in patients without simvastatin treatment (n = 18) compared with simvastatin-treated patients (n = 20). In conclusion, our findings indicate that a continuous immune system activation takes place in patients with chronic angina pectoris, predominantly involving proliferation of CD4+ T cells. Statin treatment seems to be able to decrease this inflammatory response.
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| 6. |
- Waters, David, et al.
(författare)
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The Myocardial Ischemia Reduction with Acute Cholesterol Lowering (MIRACL) trial : a new frontier for statins?
- 2001
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Ingår i: Current Controlled Trials. - London, UK : BioMed Central (BMC). - 1468-6708 .- 1468-6694. ; 2:3, s. 111-114
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Tidskriftsartikel (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The Myocardial Ischemia Reduction with Acute Cholesterol Lowering (MIRACL) Trial tested the hypothesis that intensive lowering of cholesterol with atorvastatin (80 mg/day) initiated 24-96 h after an acute coronary syndrome would, over 4 months, reduce the incidence of the composite endpoint of death, nonfatal infarction, resuscitated cardiac arrest, and recurrent symptomatic myocardial ischemia with new objective symptoms requiring emergency rehospitalization. This primary composite endpoint was reduced from 17.4% to 14.8% (P = 0.048) among the 3086 patients enrolled. The results of MIRACL suggest that patients with acute coronary syndromes should begin to receive this treatment before leaving hospital, irrespective of baseline levels of low-density lipoprotein-cholesterol.
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| 10. |
- Gómez, M.M., et al.
(författare)
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Dye-sensitized sputtered titanium oxide films for photovoltaic applications : influence of the O2/Ar gas flow ratio during the deposition
- 2003
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Ingår i: Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells. - 0927-0248 .- 1879-3398. ; 76:1, s. 37-56
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Titanium oxide films were prepared by reactive DC magnetron sputtering onto SnO2:F coated glass substrates. The O-2/Ar gas flow ratio was kept at a constant value Gamma during the deposition, and a series of films were deposited with 0.050 < Gamma < 0.072. Structural studies were performed by X-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy; the structure displayed penniform features with a clear dependence on F. Charge transport in the films was evaluated by use of time-resolved photocurrents; a diffusion model was fitted to the experimental data and two different transport mechanisms were proposed depending on the film stoichiometry. Dye sensitization in cis-dithiocyanato-bis(2,2'-bipyridyl-4,4'-dicarboxylate) ruthenium (II) was performed to evaluate incident photon-to-current conversion efficiency and solar cell properties of the films. These parameters showed a clear dependence on Gamma. Optical measurements gave evidence for the presence of polaron absorption for the film deposited at Gamma = 0.050.
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