Icosapent Ethyl Reduces Ischemic Events in Patients with a History of Prior Coronary Artery Bypass Grafting: REDUCE-IT CABG

Background: Despite advances in surgery and pharmacotherapy, there remains significant residual ischemic risk following coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) surgery. Methods: In the multicenter, placebo-controlled, double-blind trial REDUCE-IT, statin-treated patients with controlled low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and mild to moderate hypertriglyceridemia were randomized to 4g daily of icosapent ethyl or placebo. They experienced a 25% reduction in risk of a primary efficacy endpoint (cardiovascular death, myocardial infarction, stroke, coronary revascularization, or hospitalization for unstable angina) and a 26% reduction in risk of a key secondary efficacy endpoint (cardiovascular death, myocardial infarction, or stroke) when compared with placebo. The present analysis reports on the subgroup of patients from the trial with a history of CABG. Results: Of the 8,179 patients randomized in REDUCE-IT, a total of 1,837 (22.5%) had a history of CABG, with 897 patients randomized to icosapent ethyl and 940 to placebo. Baseline characteristics were similar between treatment groups. Randomization to icosapent ethyl was associated with a significant reduction in the primary endpoint (hazard ratio [HR], 0.76; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.63-0.92; P=0.004), in the key secondary endpoint (HR, 0.69; 95% CI, 0.56-0.87; P=0.001), and in total (first plus subsequent or recurrent) ischemic events (rate ratio, 0.64; 95% CI, 0.50-0.81; P=0.0002) compared with placebo. This yielded an absolute risk reduction of 6.2% (95% CI, 2.3%-10.2%) in first events, with a number needed to treat of 16 (95% CI, 10-44) over a median follow-up time of 4.8 years. Safety findings were similar to the overall study: beyond an increased rate of atrial fibrillation/flutter requiring hospitalization for at least 24 hours (5.0% vs. 3.1%; P=0.03) and a non-significant increase in bleeding, occurrences of adverse events were comparable between groups. Conclusions: In REDUCE-IT patients with a history of CABG, treatment with icosapent ethyl was associated with significant reductions in first and recurrent ischemic events.