http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=healthNews&storyID=2006-10-1
1T133250Z_01_COL148540_RTRUKOC_0_US-PSORIASIS-HEART-ATTACK.xml&WTmodLoc=NewsHome
-C3-healthNews-3

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Findings from a new study suggest that
psoriasis may be an independent risk factor for heart attack,
particularly in young individuals with severe psoriasis.

"Our findings are novel and therefore it is important that additional
studies be performed to confirm these results and determine their
therapeutic implications," the researchers comment. "In the meantime,
as part of good medical care, patients with psoriasis should be
encouraged to aggressively address their modifiable cardiovascular risk
factors."

Psoriasis is a "T-helper cell disease" and heart attack has been linked
to such diseases, Dr. Joel M. Gelfand, from the University of
Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, and colleagues explain in the Journal of
the American Medical Association.

Research has, in fact, supported a link between psoriasis and
cardiovascular disease, but all of it has come from hospital-based
studies that did not control for known cardiovascular risk factors.

To address these issues, Gelfand's group conducted a population-based
cohort study to examine the risk of heart attack in patients with and
without psoriasis, after adjusting for high blood pressure, diabetes,
lipid abnormalities, and other heart risk factors.

The study involved 127,139 patients with mild psoriasis, 3,837 with
severe psoriasis, and 556,995 controls. They were follow-up period was
5.4 years.

Over an average of 5.4 years, the heart attack rate in the control
group was 2.0 percent, while the rates in the mild and severe psoriasis
groups were 1.8 percent and 2.9 percent, respectively. The
corresponding incidences per 1000 person-years were 3.58, 4.04, and
5.13.

The association between psoriasis and heart attack risk becomes weaker
with age, the report indicates. For example, the presence of mild or
severe psoriasis in a 30-year-old patient raised the risk of heart
attack by 1.29- and 3.10-fold, respectively. In a 60-year-old patient,
by contrast, the corresponding risks were elevated just 1.08- and
1.36-fold.

********

"In the meantime, as part of good medical care, patients with psoriasis
should be encouraged to aggressively address their modifiable
cardiovascular risk factors."

Is this person suggesting that treating psoriasis (one symptom) will
lower their risk of heart disease (another symptom)? And I'll bet that
that treatment of psoriasis will include pharmaceuticals.

Heart disease and psoriasis are both caused by nutritional deficiencies
and malnourishment. Correct the malnourishment and you will correct or
mitigate both conditions.

Treating one symptom will not mitigate another symptom unless the
treatment targets the underlying causes of both symptoms.

****

The authors of tis study:

Joel M. Gelfand, MD, MSCE; Andrea L. Neimann, MD; Daniel B. Shin, BA;
Xingmei Wang, MS; David J. Margolis, MD, PhD; Andrea B. Troxel, ScD

Interesting:

David J. Margolis, M.D., Ph.D., Associate Professor, Center for
Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, and Director, Cutaneous Ulcer
Program, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Philadelphia.
Received research funding from Pfizer and Novartis. (BMJ.
2002;325:1070.)

And of course both Pfizer and Novartis have drugs specifically aimed at
psoriasis.

TC