Treatment with the Chinese medicine Tongxinluo improved outcomes for heart attack patients in a large trial, although experts are unable to explain why.
Among nearly 3,800 patients with a serious type of heart attack known as an ST-segment elevated myocardial infarction (STEMI), rates of a repeat major adverse cardiovascular event during the following month were 3.4% in those who received Tongxinluo versus 5.2% in the control group.
Participants also received guideline-recommended treatments, according to a report published on Tuesday in JAMA by researchers at hospitals across China and at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas.
The odds of experiencing another heart attack, a stroke, need for coronary intervention such as angioplasty, or heart related death after 30 days were 36% lower with Tongxinluo than with a placebo, after accounting for patients’ individual risk factors, researchers reported.
The pattern persisted a year later, the researchers found.
Tongxinluo consists of a mixture of powders and extracts derived from plants, insects such as centipedes or cicada, and other sources, none of which have documented cardiovascular effects, Dr. Gregory Curfman, the journal’s executive editor, noted in a commentary.
The compound, which in Chinese means “to open (tong) the network (luo) of the heart (xin),” is approved in China for treating angina and stroke, and is sold online as a dietary supplement, Curfman said.
“Efforts at isolating and testing the specific active ingredient(s) of Tongxinluo might provide the world with the next advance in the treatment of acute STEMI,” Dr. Richard Bach of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri wrote in a separate editorial.
