Triple therapy to treat atherosclerosis

What is it about?

Atherosclerosis is the leading cause of cardiovascular disease. Statins can help lower the low-density lipoprotein cholesterol that causes plaque, but treatment typically leads to only a modest reduction in plaque volume. In a recent paper in the Journal of Lipid Research, Marianne Pouwer of the Netherlands Organization of Applied Scientific Research in Leiden and a team of researchers in the U.S. and the Netherlands identified a combination of drugs that not only slowed plaque progression but also reversed it and improved plaque composition. The researchers fed mice a high-cholesterol, high-fat diet and treated them with atorvastatin in combination with monoclonal antibodies alirocumab and/or evinacumab. The mice treated with the statin and one antibody had lower cholesterol and slower plaque progression compared to mice that received no treatment. Mice treated with a combination of all three drugs had plaques that were not only smaller but had less macrophage content and were less likely to rupture. These findings indicate that high-intensity treatment with multiple drugs could be a promising approach in humans as well

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Why is it important?

This is the first study in mice using the combination of clinical hypolipidemic drugs that shows true regression of atherosclerosis, not only macrophages content, but also of total lesion size while mice were kept on the Western type diet during both progression and regression phases.

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