{"id":215227,"date":"2025-06-02T09:23:54","date_gmt":"2025-06-02T14:23:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/06\/concept-and-practice-in-the-use-of-high-dose-eicosapentaenoic-acid-for-cardiovascular-disease-prevention-in-hypertriglyceridaemia"},"modified":"2025-06-02T09:23:54","modified_gmt":"2025-06-02T14:23:54","slug":"concept-and-practice-in-the-use-of-high-dose-eicosapentaenoic-acid-for-cardiovascular-disease-prevention-in-hypertriglyceridaemia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/06\/concept-and-practice-in-the-use-of-high-dose-eicosapentaenoic-acid-for-cardiovascular-disease-prevention-in-hypertriglyceridaemia","title":{"rendered":"Concept and practice in the use of high-dose eicosapentaenoic acid for cardiovascular disease prevention in hypertriglyceridaemia"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

Ischaemic heart disease remains the main cause of death worldwide. 1<\/a> Within its multifactorial aetiology low-density lipoprotein (LDL) and other apolipoprotein (apo) B-containing lipoproteins play a central, causal role, promoting the development of the underlying process of atherosclerosis. The use of statins and other drugs\u2014ezetimibe, proprotein convertase subtilisin\/kexin type 9 (PCSK9) inhibitors, bempedoic acid\u2014to lower LDL is a central strategy in the prevention of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) in both primary and secondary settings. 2<\/a> However, in many individuals, a substantial ASCVD risk remains after LDL-cholesterol (LDL-C) goal achievement, and elevated plasma triglyceride (TG) is recognised as an important component of this residual risk. 3<\/a> Plasma TG, or more specifically TG-rich lipoproteins (TRL), is therefore an additional target for lipid-lowering therapy. Outcome studies of TG lowering using classical drugs such as fibrates and high-dose niacin when added to statins failed to demonstrate further ASCVD risk reduction, although retrospective analyses suggest that subgroups characterised by high TG and low high-density lipoprotein (HDL) may have positive results. 4\u20137<\/a> An alternative approach, treatment with high-dose eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), has been shown to reduce cardiovascular risk in patients with (and without) hypertriglyceridaemia who are on statins. 8\u201310<\/a><\/p>\n

This review explores the concepts behind, and practical implementation of, an evidence-based therapeutic strategy that tailors further intervention according to the plasma lipid profile in patients on standard statin therapy who are often undertreated. 11<\/a><\/p>\n

Genetic analyses provide robust evidence that elevated TG is a causal risk factor for ASCVD 12 13<\/a> and underpin the finding from epidemiological studies that raised TG levels are positively and linearly related to cardiovascular risk (figure 1A<\/a>). 14 15<\/a> The importance of these observations is that they reveal an often unaddressed major risk factor that is of particular relevance in people with obesity or type 2 diabetes in whom TG levels are frequently elevated. 16<\/a> Further, outcome trials have shown that elevated TG levels (again especially in type 2 diabetics) are associated with high residual cardiovascular risk in statin-treated patients with established cardiovascular disease, even if they have well-controlled LDL-C. 17\u201319<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ischaemic heart disease remains the main cause of death worldwide. 1 Within its multifactorial aetiology low-density lipoprotein (LDL) and other apolipoprotein (apo) B-containing lipoproteins play a central, causal role, promoting the development of the underlying process of atherosclerosis. The use of statins and other drugs\u2014ezetimibe, proprotein convertase subtilisin\/kexin type 9 (PCSK9) inhibitors, bempedoic acid\u2014to lower [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":662,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,412],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-215227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-genetics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=215227"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215227\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=215227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=215227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=215227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}