Benazepril offers hope to patients with advance renal disease

DailyUpdates 19th May, 2006: Today's edition of DailyUpdates (see it in full here) carries a couple of important articles on renal disease. One loks at the outcome of patients with renal dysfunction across various acute coronary syndromes. The featured article however demonstrates the efficacy of Novartis' Benazepril in treating advanced renal disease

Benazepril offers hope to patients with advance renal disease - Angiotensin-converting-enzyme (ACE) inhibitors provide renal protection in patients with mild-to-moderate renal insufficiency. More advanced disease continues to present a major problem however. Increased prevalence of diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular disease, all causal factors of renal disease, drives growth of the end-stage renal disease (ESRD) sector. On average, an ESRD patient uses >$7,000 of drugs/year, representing a significant opportunity for pharmaceutical companies in treating the symptoms, comorbid conditions and treatment side effects of ESRD (see Drug Treatment in End-Stage Renal Disease). Today's featured study from Novartis is important since it establishes the ACE inhibitor, benazepril as an effective treatment of more advanced renal insufficiency. The primary outcome was the composite of a doubling of the serum creatinine level, end-stage renal disease, or death. Only 41% of benazepril-treated patients with the most advanced renal insufficiency reached this end-point as compared to 60% of patients receiving placebo. This benefit did not appear to be attributable to blood-pressure control.