Natural substance beneficial to heart attack patients

Survivors of heart attack now have a greater chance of survival. After their hospitalization, on top of the home medications, the doctors prescribe maintenance drugs that may help improve a heart attack patient’s quality of life.

One of these medications is L-carnitine. Deficiency in L-carnitine can cause oxygen deprivation in the heart muscle that may lead to angina and heart disease. At high risk are people on hemodialysis and those who have weak heart muscles.

Results of the L-Carnitine Ecocardiografia Digitalizzata Infarto Miocardico (CEDIM), a multi-center, randomized, double-blind trial, published in the American Heart Journal in February 2000, showed that metabolic intervention with L-carnitine may be a therapeutic approach for preventing left ventricular enlargement of the heart.

Dr. Sabino Iliceto of the Institute of Cardiology, University of Padua, Italy, and his colleagues tested the efficacy of L-carnitine administration on long-term left ventricular dilation.

Results of the CEDIM trial suggest that L-carnitine therapy may limit the adverse effects of heart attack, thus improving a heart attack patient’s chance of survival.

"There seems to be strong evidence to suggest that carnitine supplementation (immediate and short-term [less than 30 days]), may be beneficial to patients with ischemic heart disease," said Dr. Carl Pepine, professor of medicine at the University of Florida College of Medicine, and Dr. Michael Welsch, associate professor at the Louisiana State University.

In an article in the book The Carnitine System, Pepine and Welsch presented evidence to suggest a beneficial effect of L-carnitine on clinical outcomes, suggesting improvements in symptoms, exercise tolerance and reductions in mortality.

In another study, conducted by Davini et al, heart patients treated with L-carnitine also showed an improvement in clinical symptoms accompanied by a lower death rate.

The US Food and Drug Administration has approved L-carnitine as a therapy for low-energy levels, congestive heart failure and other diseases associated with low-cellular energy levels.

In the Philippines, L-carnitine is manufactured by Pascual Laboratories. For more information on the benefits of L-carnitine, call the Carnicor hotline at 920-1911 local 146 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday to Friday.

Carnicor is a prescription drug and should be bought only upon a doctor’s advice.