CHICAGO — An experimental drug boosted good cholesterol so high and dropped bad cholesterol so low in a study that doctors were stunned and voiced renewed hopes for a new way of preventing heart attacks and strokes.
“We are the most excited we have been in decades,” said Dr. Christopher Cannon of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, who led the study of the novel drug for Merck. “This could really be the next big thing.”
The drug, anacetrapib, will not be on the market any time soon. It needs more testing to see if its dramatic effects on cholesterol will translate into fewer heart attacks, strokes and deaths. Merck announced a 30,000-patient study to answer that question, and it will take several years.
But the sheer magnitude of the new medicine’s effects so far excited doctors at an American Heart Association conference in Chicago, where results were presented Wednesday.
“The data look spectacular, beyond what anybody would have expected,” said Dr. Robert Eckel, a University of Colorado cardiologist and past president of the AHA. “It’s like a rocket to Jupiter versus one to the moon. I can think of many of my patients who could use the drug right now.”
Merck’s Dr. Luciano Rossetti agreed.
“We are trying not to be too giddy. The potential benefit is enormous,” said Rossetti, senior vice president of global scientific strategy at the company, based in Whitehouse Station, N.J.
For years, doctors have focused on lowering LDL, or bad cholesterol, to cut heart risks. Statin medicines such as Lipitor and Zocor do this, and generic versions cost less than a dollar a day. But many statin users still suffer heart attacks, so doctors have been trying to get LDL to very low levels and to boost HDL, or good cholesterol.
Anacetrapib helps keep fat particles attached to HDL, which carries them in the bloodstream to the liver to be disposed of.
Merck says it is way too soon to estimate how much the drug would cost. Shares of the company closed Wednesday at $34.47, up 37 cents.
An LDL of 100 to 129 is considered good for healthy people, but some patients at higher- than-usual risk of a heart attack should aim for less than 100 or even less than 70, guidelines say. For HDL, 40 to 59 is OK, but higher is better. After six months in the study:
• LDL scores fell from 81 to 45 in those on anacetrapib and from 82 to 77 in those given dummy pills.
• HDL rose from 41 to 101 in the drug group and from 40 to 46 in those on dummy pills.
Importantly, there were no signs of the blood-pressure problems that led Pfizer to walk away from an $800 million investment in torcetrapib, a similar drug it was developing four years ago.
