Drug used for severe heart failure found to have dangerous side

CHICAGO -- A drug commonly used for short-term treatment of worsening heart failure in hospitalized patients may cause dangerously low blood pressure and abnormal heart rhythms, researchers found.

The findings suggest that the drug, milrinone, should be reserved for patients who do not respond to other medication, said Dr. Mihai Gheorghiade of Northwestern University.

The study is one of the few to compare a placebo with a drug for worsening heart failure, a condition that sends about 1 million Americans to the hospital each year. Despite the poor results, it shows that such studies can and should be done on similar drugs, Gheorghiade said.

"We should not take things for granted just because they have been approved, to assume they are useful," said Gheorghiade, who led the study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

An accompanying editorial says the use of other drugs commonly used in worsening heart failure, dopamine and dobutamine, should be reconsidered given the milrinone findings, since all three drugs work similarly to strengthen the heartbeat. Milrinone, sold as Primacor, was approved in 1987.

Heart failure, in which the heart gradually loses its ability to pump blood efficiently, affects nearly 5 million Americans.