Coronary Artery Disease – Medications

Transcript

There are many medications that can be used to treat coronary artery disease. If you have a stent placed, it’s very important to be on what’s called dual anti-platelet therapy (or DAPT for short.) The two medications that you would normally be prescribed – one would be aspirin and the second would be another anti-platelet agent, of which there are three that are commonly used. Most commonly, Plavix is used. The other two are Ticagrelor and Prasugrel. Other medications that are used for CAD are nitrates as well as Hydralazine that can help control symptoms such as chest pain. Other medications that are used in coronary artery disease focus on the risk factors in the disease. For example, blood pressure medications to control your blood pressure, medications to control your blood sugars if you have diabetes, aspirin (as I already mentioned) if you have a stent placed, but even if you don’t have one, you can use that as well. Lipid lowering medications or cholesterol lowering medications such as statins are used as well. Common side effects of these medications can be low blood pressure, interactions with other medications, as well as side effects of statins, which would be a change in your liver enzymes as well as muscle breakdown. These tests can all be monitored by your primary care physician or cardiologist and stopped if necessary. Other modifications that can help treat this condition would be: absolutely to stop smoking, cut down on your drinking if that is a problem, as well as cardiac rehab in which you’d work with a physical therapist – not only to improve your exercise tolerance, but to improve your risk factors as well. Diet can also be improved and it’s generally recommended to cut down on the amount of trans fats that you eat.