In Italy, every year, there are about 130 thousand people suffer a heart attack and 20% experience a new event within 12 months. Huge numbers that science is trying in every way to reduce. In this context comes a study promoted byHarvard Medical School di Boston which has identified a new one “sponge” protein which cleans the arteries of the heart from cholesterol in excess, avoiding the formation of dangerous plaques. Is called “apolipoprotein apoA -I” and absorbs, just like a sponge, the fats it comes into contact with, including those that could clog the vessels. Among the centers involved in the experimental therapy there is also the‘IRCCS MultiMedica of Sesto San Giovanni who enrolled his first patient for the trial “ApoA-I Event Reducing in Ischemic Syndromes II (AEGIS-II)”.
“Primary goal of the work,” explained the doctor Roberto Pedretti, director of the Cardiovascular Department of Irccs MultiMedica, “is to observe whether this treatment is able to reduce the risk of further cardiovascular events in the first 90 days after heart attack, the period of greatest vulnerability”. And in fact the study aims to recruit approx 20 thousand participants through 1,035 centers around the world. This is an innovative approach, explains the professor Giuseppe Ambrosiocoordinator for Italy of the AEGIS-II study and deputy scientific director of Irccs MultiMedica: “While existing drugs act by reducing the synthesis of cholesterol and preventing the formation of new accumulations, this therapy has a more ambitious goal than ever achieved before : attack the plaques already present in the arteries. It is a completely new approach, which we hope will contribute to the reduction of acute events in those who have had a heart attack. The preliminary results “, he concludes,” are very encouraging “.
