Drano for the Heart

There is a new experimental drug being tried in Oklahoma:

LIQUID DRANO FOR THE HEART:

Researchers in Oklahoma and elsewhere are infusing heart disease patients with a high-density lipoprotein, which they say reverses years of heart disease damage. Researchers essentially inject patients with a laboratory-produced version of HDL, or "good cholesterol," which naturally removes fatty buildups from arteries. Thirty-six patients received doses of HDL, and 11 patients served as a control group in the study. Researchers say they got the idea for their study after observing a group of people who lived in Limone sul Garde -- a town in northern Italy. These Italians had exceptionally low levels of good cholesterol but lived long, healthy lives. Researchers later discovered that these people had a mutation in their HDL gene that caused good cholesterol to break down quickly even though their bodies made plenty of it. Researchers then turned this same strain of HDL into an experimental drug and gave it to heart disease patients.

For more information, contact:

Kathy Stillwell
Research Coordinator
Southwest Cardiology Associates, Inc.
(405) 644-5120

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