Novartis's Lescol drug protects heart after surgery

MUNICH (Reuters) - Giving patients Novartis's anti-cholesterol drug Lescol after major vascular surgery reduces the risk of serious heart problems, researchers said on Monday.

More than 2 percent of patients undergoing non-cardiac vascular surgery -- surgery to arteries and veins -- die from heart attacks and other cardiovascular problems.

Lescol, a so-called statin drug, appears to be effective in reducing this risk by cutting inflammation and stabilizing plaques in coronary arteries that might otherwise rupture, Don Poldermans of the Erasmus Medical Centre in Rotterdam said.

Results of a 500-patient study presented by Poldermans at the annual meeting of the European Society of Cardiology showed only 10.9 percent of vascular surgery patients taking Lescol suffered myocardial ischemia -- reduced blood supply to the heart muscle -- against 18.9 percent of those on placebo.

Lescol is less potent than some other statin drugs but patients in the study were given the highest dose of the medicine as an extended release formulation, which lasts around four days.

Lescol, known generically as fluvastatin, is one of Novartis's older products. Sales in 2007 totaled $665 million, down 8 percent on a year earlier.

(Reporting by Ben Hirschler; editing by Sue Thomas)