Common painkillers may raise risk of heart failure

[Angel]

Patients who use non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), which include over-the-counter analgesics such as ibuprofen or naproxen, have a small increased risk of experiencing a first hospitalization for heart failure, researchers from Spain report. They also found that for patients with pre-existing heart failure, NSAIDs may worsen the condition, triggering the need for hospital admission.

This increased risk may have "considerable public health impact," particularly among the elderly, the population most at risk for heart failure, notes the study team in a report in the journal Heart posted online today.

Dr. Consuelo Huerta and colleagues compared NSAID use among 1,396 individuals between 60 and 84 years old who were hospitalized for non-fatal heart failure and a random sample of 5,000 subjects (controls).

Fourteen percent of the heart failure patients were current NSAID users compared with 10 percent of the controls. NSAIDs were primarily used for osteoarthritis.



With current NSAID use, the overall risk of a first hospitalization for heart failure was increased by 30 percent after accounting for major heart failure risk factors, report Huerta and colleagues from Centro Espanol de Investigacion Farmacoepidemiologica in Madrid.

The increased risk of heart failure hospitalization associated with individual NSAIDs ranged from 10 percent with diclofenac to more than threefold with indomethacin. The dose and duration of use of the drugs had no apparent effects.

Heart failure hospitalization was also associated with known risk factors including high blood pressure, diabetes, kidney failure, other heart disease and anemia. Obesity, smoking, alcohol use, and recent hospitalizations and specialists' visits -- two indicators of other illness -- were also associated with an increased risk of hospitalization.

However, a prior diagnosis of heart failure was the main risk factor triggering a first hospitalization for heart failure, increasing the risk by more than sevenfold.

The investigators point out that their results are compatible with the findings of other published studies indicating that NSAIDs exacerbate heart failure symptoms, leading to hospitalization among susceptible patients, such as those with a history of cardiovascular disease and, in particular, previous heart failure.

The new study adds the finding that NSAIDs trigger the risk of hospitalization for heart failure in patients without a history of heart failure, the researchers conclude.