Posted by Jack (209.139.56.11) on September 23, 2000 at 15:05:17:
In Reply to: calcium channel antagonists under fire posted by annemarie on September 23, 2000 at 14:34:57:
This story has been around for awhile.
It seems that the heart problem folks who take calcium channel blockers such as verapamil have a slightly higher incidence of cariovascular events than those heart problem folks who take other medications.
These events included but were not limited to HEART FAILURE.
There is absolutely no evidence that verapamil creates any of these problems in an otherwise healthy individual - that is, someone without heart problems such as a healthy clusterhead who takes it for other reasons.
It should also be noted that this higher incidence of cardiovascular events was not detected in those patients who use the slow release variety of verapamil. I mentioned this to my nuero on my last visit and he told me that he had switched to the slow release variety for all his patients.
Verapamil was also once implicated in another study as causing cancer. Subsequent studies strongly refuted this.
The bottom line is still this - Verapamil is the safest of all cluster preventatives and if you do not have serious heart disease it will not give you a myocardial infarction ( which happens to be my favorite medical term and which serves to euphimistically reduce the terror that is associated with the term " heart attack " and , in fact, is the term that I will use when I have my "heart attack" because although I won't anyone to know I had a heart attack, I can't lie either.
Regards,
Jack