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Glaxo heart drug shown to be safer than rival

GlaxoSmithKline's Arixtra, a treatment of acute coronary syndromes, has been shown in a large study to be as effective as Sanofi-Aventis' industry standard Lovenox, whilst demonstrating a significantly better safety profile.

This landmark head-to-head trial, evaluated more than 20,000 patients with ACS, and was presented at the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) meeting in Stockholm, Sweden.

Arixtra was as effective as Lovenox for the primary composite endpoint of preventing death, myocardial infarction, and refractory ischaemia at 9 days (incidence of 5.9% and 5.8%, respectively). Furthermore, Arixtra was associated with a 47% reduction in major bleeding vs. Lovenox in this study.

“The OASIS 5 findings demonstrate that Arixtra is likely an effective anti-thrombotic drug in many patients with ACS already receiving aspirin and clopidogrel,” said Dr Salim Yusuf, principal investigator of the study, and professor of medicine, McMaster University and Hamilton Heath Sciences, Ontario, Canada.

ACS represents a complex group of cardiac diseases that account for about 2.5 million hospital admissions worldwide and are a major cause of mortality and morbidity in Western countries.