Nancy Walsh
Med Page Today
January 12, 2011
Any one of the nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs commonly used for musculoskeletal pain can have cardiovascular risks — although naproxen appears to be less potentially harmful than the others, according to a network meta-analysis.
The analysis, which encompassed more than 30 randomized trials of seven NSAID drugs, found the rate ratio for myocardial infarction for rofecoxib (Vioxx) was 2.12 (95% credibility interval [CI] 1.26 to 3.56), while the MI rate ratio for naproxen was 0.82 (95% CI 0.37 to 1.67), Peter Jüni, MD, and colleagues from the University of Bern in Switzerland, wrote online in the BMJ.
Since the withdrawal of the COX-2 inhibitor rofecoxib from the market in 2004, questions have been raised about the cardiovascular safety of not only that class of drugs, but also for other conventional anti-inflammatory drugs. And traditional meta-analyses have not succeeded in clarifying the issue.
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