Medicine:AIM-HIGH trial
AIM-HIGH was a multi-center clinical trial related to the prophylactic treatment coronary artery disease involving some 90 sites in the United States and Canada , which was conducted between 2006 and 2012 and involved 3,414 volunteers [1]. AIM-HIGH was an acronym for Atherothrombosis Intervention in Metabolic Syndrome with low HDL/HIGH Triglycerides trial[2]
Description
The trial was designed to test whether adding high dose, extended-release niacin to simvastatin may be a better than statin therapy alone in reducing long-term cardiovascular events. The participants, who all had a history of cardiovascular disease, were selected according to the following profile: [3]
- LDL cholesterol was controlled
- HDL cholesterol levels were low
- triglycerides levels were high
Results
The trial was stopped early because there was a demonstrable lack of efficacy for this intervention. The addition of high dose, extended release niacin to a statin did increase HDL cholesterol, as expected, but did not reduce cardiovascular events. The analysis also showed that there was little to no probability that adding high-dose, extended release niacin to statin treatment would show a benefit even if the study continued to its originally planned completion.
References
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