New Heart Failure Therapy Proves Most Effective in Women

A therapy to prevent heart failure is twice as effective in women as in men, a new study finds. It's the first time that a heart treatment has been shown to offer greater benefit to women, the researchers added. The finding was "unexpected, but extremely important," study author Dr. Arthur J. Moss, a professor of medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center, said in a news release. He and his colleagues looked at the effectiveness of cardiac resynchronization therapy with defibrillator (CRT-D) in 1,820 patients in Canada, Europe and the United States.

CRT-D combines the benefits of both an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD) and cardiac resynchronization therapy. ICDs prevent sudden, irregular rhythm-related cardiac death, and resynchronization therapy boosts heart function and reduces the risk of heart failure and related symptoms. CRT-D is approved in the United States to treat patients with severe heart failure and those with mild heart failure to prevent them from progressing to advanced heart failure. The CRT-D device was developed by Boston Scientific, which was a partner in this study.

Among women, CRT-D led to a 70 percent reduction in heart failure and a 72 percent reduction in death. Among men, the treatment led to a 35 percent reduction in heart failure, according to the report published in the Feb. 7 issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. "It's not that men did poorly in the trial, but rather, women had really fantastic results, likely due to the type of heart disease we see more commonly in women," Moss said in the journal news release.

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Moderate Alcohol Use Helps Prevent Sudden Cardiac Death: Study

In yet another study, a moderate intake of alcohol has been shown to be healthy for the heart. The current research found that when women consumed between one half to one drink a day, their risk of sudden cardiac death dropped by 36 percent. However, when women doubled their intake and had more than two drinks per day, they upped their risk of sudden cardiac death by about 15 percent. "Numerous studies have found a protective association between alcohol intake and coronary heart disease, stroke and congestive heart failure, but little research has been done on alcohol and sudden cardiac death," explained study author Stephanie Chiuve, an instructor in medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

"In this study, we wanted to look at the association of moderate alcohol intake and the risk of sudden cardiac death in women. We found a U-shaped association between alcohol and sudden cardiac death," said Chiuve, which means that too little or too much alcohol intake was associated with a higher risk of sudden cardiac death than moderate intake of alcohol. "For women who choose to drink alcohol, they should have about one drink a day. That's where we saw the greatest benefit," she said. Results of the study are published in the October issue of the journal Heart Rhythm.

Although the study wasn't designed to figure out exactly how alcohol might help prevent sudden cardiac death, Chiuve said that alcohol has a beneficial effect on cholesterol levels and helps reduce the amount of plaque that collects in the blood vessels. She said that it doesn't appear that any one particular type of alcohol is more beneficial than others, suggesting that it's the ethanol contained in alcoholic beverages that provides the health boost. But, the news on alcohol isn't all good. Alcohol can also have what's known as pro-arrhythmic effects. That means alcohol can cause heart palpitations. The effect is so well-known that it's been dubbed "holiday heart syndrome."

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