Health authority NICE has recommended a new drug that could help transform the lives of people living in heart failure.
Sacubiril valsartan is the first drug of its kind and will look to manage the symptoms of people in the UK with heart failure. In addition, it has the potential to reduce the more than 30,000 hospital admissions for this condition each year in England and prevent deaths.
The drug will only be suitable to around 100,000 people whose heart is only able to pump a reduced amount of oxygenated blood around the body that is not already controlled by the commonly used drugs ACE inhibitors or ARBs.
Heart failure happens when the heart muscle cannot pump enough blood to meet the needs of the body and currently affects over half a million people in the UK. There is currently no cure and symptoms include shortness of breath, swelling of the feet, stomach and lower back and fatigue.
Professor Peter Weissberg, Medical Director at the British Heart Foundation (BHF), said, ‘There is currently no cure for heart failure and we welcome the news that this drug will now be available to some patients to help control and manage their condition.
‘In the UK over half a million people are living with this crippling illness which can cause chronic breathlessness and fatigue, leaving patients with a long and difficult fight for life.
‘Through generous donations to our Mending Broken Hearts Appeal we have been able to fund around £25 million of regenerative medicine research. Recent advances in this field have shown that repairing the heart after a heart attack, something that is currently impossible, is a realistic goal. But we must fund more research to develop promising discoveries made in the lab into treatments for people living with debilitating heart failure.’
