Background. The published reports of the effectiveness of simvastatin in treatment of hypercholesterolemia were mostly conducted in western populations, and only few studies in Asian or domestic populations have ever been reported. By regulations from Bureau of National Health Insurance, the effective dosage of lipid lowering agents should be started from lower dose, such as 20 mg of simvastatin per day. Whether this dosage of simvastatin is effective for treatment of patients with hypercholesterolemia and the efficacy and safety of such dosage are the objects of this study.
Materials and Methods. After the approval of IRB in a medical center located at north Taiwan, a randomized 12-week study was conducted to evaluate the efficacy and safety of 20mg/day simvastatin treatment on hypercholesterolemia. By randomization 65 patients, followed up at cardiovascular outpatient department under the diagnosis of primary hypercholesterolemia, were enrolled into a 4-week washout period, and finally 49 intent-to-treat patients entered a 12-week treatment with 20mg simvastatin per day, given through oral routine in the evening. Demographic and laboratory data were obtained before and after treatment. The primary efficacy measure was the changes from baseline in lipid parameters. Tolerability was assessed in terms of the overall incidence of adverse experiences and the most commonly reported adverse experiences.
Results. The per-protocol analyses included 39 hypercholesterolemic patients whom completed 12 weeks of therapy. Total cholesterol and LDL cholesterol at the end of the study period showed significant reductions by 22.5¢H (p<0.001) and 29.8¢H(p<0.001), respectively. Triglyceride also showed a significant reduction by 31.8% (p=0.006), whereas total alkaline phosphatase and calcium showed a weak and insignificant change over the study period. The female group had significantly greater reduction in triglyceride than that in the male group, and the non-smoking group also had significantly greater reduction in triglyceride than that in smoking group after 12-week treatment. There were 17 studied cases (34.7%) had minor transient but clinical insignificant increases in serum aspartate aminotransferase and alanine aminotransferase, and 7 cases (14.3%) experienced symptom of painful muscle, of whom 3 cases (6.1%) dropped out this study.
Conclusion. Our results, although obtained from a small scale of hypercholesterolemic patients, suggest a probable positive efficacy and good tolerability with only few minor side effects of simvastatin on blood lipids.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:NSYSU/oai:NSYSU:etd-0823106-162536 |
| Date | 23 August 2006 |
| Creators | Chiang, Hsiao-chiu |
| Contributors | Ming-jen Yang, SJ Hwang, WC Hung |
| Publisher | NSYSU |
| Source Sets | NSYSU Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Archive |
| Language | Cholon |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.lib.nsysu.edu.tw/ETD-db/ETD-search/view_etd?URN=etd-0823106-162536 |
| Rights | off_campus_withheld, Copyright information available at source archive |
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