Background: Coronary artery disease is the most prevalent manifestation among cardiovascular diseases. Despite modern treatment, risk of ischemic complications in patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS) remains important. The late Na+ current blocker ranolazine has shown to reduce the risk of recurrent ischemia and worsening of angina in patients with non-ST-segment elevation ACS by possibly improving myocardial perfusion, but up to now no trial has addressed whether this enhanced perfusion also leads to a decrease in ischemic myocardium of patients with ACS. We designed a pilot trial (Reduction of Ischemic Myocardium with Ranolazine-Treatment IN patients with acute myocardial Infarction, ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT01797484) for feasibility and proof of concept that a 6-week ranolazine add-on therapy would reduce the area of ischemic myocardium in patients with ACS.
Methods and results: The trial was designed in a 2-armed, controlled and randomized way. Twenty participants with unstable angina, proof of acute cardiac ischemia, and myocardial dyskinesia by speckle-tracking echocardiography were included. Ten participants received the study drug ranolazine additionally to standard treatment. The control group received standard treatment without additional study medication. Speckle-tracking echocardiography was performed before coronary intervention, before the first dose of ranolazine, and after 6 weeks of ranolazine treatment. Ranolazine was administered safely during acute myocardial infarction. Speckle-tracking echocardiography proved to be suitable for evaluation of myocardial dyskinesia. Patients receiving ranolazine showed a trend to higher normal fraction of the cumulative global strain than patients in the standard treatment group (15% vs 11%). No major complications relating study medication were observed.
Conclusion: In conclusion, in this preliminary hypothesis-driven study, 6-week ranolazine therapy was shown to decrease the area of dyskinetic myocardium in patients with ACS by trend. Global strain rate measurement using speckle-tracking echocardiography can be applied measuring those effects and is, compared to other techniques, safe and harmless. Our data provide a sound basis for a follow-up trial.
Keywords: coronary artery disease; ischemia; myocardial perfusion; ranolazine; speckle-tracking echocardiography.