But high-dose vitamins plus active chelation may reduce events among patients with previous MI
TUESDAY, March 12 (HealthDay News) -- For adults with previous myocardial infarction, high-dose oral vitamin and mineral supplementation is not associated with a reduction in cardiac events, according to a study presented at the annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology, held from March 9 to 11 in San Francisco.
Gervasio A. Lamas, M.D., from the Mount Sinai Medical Center in Miami Beach, and colleagues conducted a multicenter study involving 1,708 patients with previous myocardial infarction who were randomized to an active or placebo chelation group and an active or placebo vitamin group in a 2 × 2 factorial design. The chelation group received 40 intravenous treatments, each lasting about three hours, over about 18 months. In addition, they received high-dose vitamins and minerals (three pills twice a day) or placebo.
Over an average follow-up of 55 months, the researchers observed no significant difference in cardiac events between the oral vitamins and minerals group versus the placebo group (27 and 30 percent, respectively). There was a significant difference between the active chelation, high-dose vitamin group and the placebo/placebo group (26 versus 32 percent).
"We did not see a significant benefit of vitamins alone for patients who had a heart attack," Lamas said in a statement. "Interestingly, patients who received both high-dose vitamins and active chelation compared to placebo of both appeared to have additional benefit, but more research is needed to understand the results."
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