Preventive cardiologyEffect of Homocysteine-Lowering B Vitamin Treatment on Angiographic Progression of Coronary Artery Disease: A Western Norway B Vitamin Intervention Trial (WENBIT) Substudy
Section snippets
Methods
The subjects included in the present study participated in the Western Norway B Vitamin Intervention Trial (WENBIT), a double-blinded, placebo-controlled, 2-center trial that included 3,090 adult patients (20.5% women) who had undergone coronary angiography for suspected CAD. The details and the main results of the trial have been previously described.7 To simultaneously evaluate the effect of folic acid/vitamin B12 and vitamin B6, the patients were randomly assigned to 1 of 4 groups, using a 2
Results
Figure 1 shows the numbers of patients eligible for and included in the present study. Of the 570 WENBIT participants who underwent PCI after baseline coronary angiography at Haukeland University Hospital, 371 (65%) underwent repeat angiography. Of these, 342 patients (92%) underwent scheduled repeat angiography and 29 (8%) had a clinical indication for repeat angiography. A total of 23 participants (6%) were excluded from the analysis because of inadequate angiograms. Of the remaining 348
Discussion
In the present substudy of a large randomized clinical trial of homocysteine-lowering vitamin B treatment, a total of 348 patients were available for serial QCA analysis after baseline coronary angiography. Of these, 183 patients had 309 coronary lesions at baseline or follow-up that fulfilled the angiographically defined inclusion criteria. The patients were followed up for a median of 10 months for the assessment of CAD progression using QCA. The baseline homocysteine levels were relatively
Acknowledgment
We especially thank study nurse Janne Dyngeland, RN, and statistician Tore Wentzel-Larsen, MSc, for their invaluable help.
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The Western Norway B Vitamin Intervention Trial was funded by the Advanced Research Program and Research Council of Norway, Oslo, Norway; the Norwegian Foundation for Health and Rehabilitation, the Norwegian Heart and Lung Patient Organisation, Oslo, Norway; the Norwegian Ministry of Health and Care Services, Oslo, Norway; the Western Norway Regional Health Authority, Stavanger, Norway; the Department of Heart Disease at Haukeland University Hospital, Bergen, Norway; the Locus for Homocysteine and Related Vitamins at the University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway; the Locus for Cardiac Research at the University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway; the Foundation to Promote Research Into Functional Vitamin B12 Deficiency, Bergen, Norway, and Alpharma Inc., Copenhagen, Denmark.