{"id":7645,"date":"2025-06-27T16:28:11","date_gmt":"2025-06-27T13:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/?p=7645"},"modified":"2025-06-27T16:28:11","modified_gmt":"2025-06-27T13:28:11","slug":"summary-inflammation-emerging-as-a-central-target-in-cardiovascular-risk-assessment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/en\/summary-inflammation-emerging-as-a-central-target-in-cardiovascular-risk-assessment\/","title":{"rendered":"Summary: Inflammation Emerging as a Central Target in Cardiovascular Risk Assessment"},"content":{"rendered":"
Summary: Inflammation Emerging as a Central Target in Cardiovascular Risk Assessment<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Source: Interview with Dr. Paul Ridker,Harvard Medical School & Brigham and Women\u2019s Hospital , announced on June 3, 2025.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Background:\u00a0 Dr. Paul Ridker, a leading expert in cardiovascular prevention, holds the Eugene Braunwald Professorship of Medicine at Harvard Medical School\u2014an academic title named in honor of the legendary cardiologist and author of Braunwald\u2019s Heart Disease.<\/div>\n
He is widely known for pioneering the \u201cinflammation hypothesis\u201d in heart disease and for leading two landmark clinical trials:<\/div>\n
\u2022 JUPITER (2008): Demonstrated the benefit of statins in patients with elevated hs-CRP but normal LDL.<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 CANTOS (2017): Provided the first direct evidence that targeting inflammation (IL-1\u03b2) reduces cardiovascular events independently of lipid levels.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Key Highlights:<\/div>\n
1. Paradigm Shift Toward Inflammation<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 Inflammation is now recognized alongside cholesterol as a major contributor to atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD).<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 High-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP) is a validated biomarker for vascular inflammation and long-term risk.<\/span><\/div>\n
2. CRP Surpassing Cholesterol as a Predictor<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 Long-term data from the Women\u2019s Health Study showed hs-CRP outperformed LDL and Lp(a) in predicting cardiovascular events.<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 Early identification of inflammation-based risk may allow for preventive intervention decades before clinical manifestation.<\/span><\/div>\n
3. Call for Routine Inflammatory Screening<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 Dr. Ridker recommends universal testing for LDL, hs-CRP, and Lp(a) in both primary and secondary prevention.<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 Quote: \u201cDoctors won\u2019t treat what they don\u2019t measure.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n
4. Pharmaceutical Advancements<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 Colchicine became the first anti-inflammatory drug approved by the FDA in 2023 for coronary inflammation.<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 Other drug classes with anti-inflammatory effects include GLP-1 receptor agonists and SGLT-2 inhibitors.<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 Ongoing trials are targeting the NLRP3\u2013IL-1\u2013IL-6 inflammatory axis in CAD, HFpEF, and CKD.<\/span><\/div>\n
5. Emerging Role of Imaging<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 Cardiac CT with fat attenuation index enables direct visualization of coronary inflammation.<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 More research is needed before adopting this imaging tool into routine practice.<\/span><\/div>\n
6. Simplified, Cost-effective Prevention Strategy<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 A practical approach includes: medical history, physical exam, and 3 blood tests (LDL, hs-CRP, Lp(a)).<\/span><\/div>\n
\u2022 Family cascade screening is recommended when elevated inflammatory or lipid markers are found.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\u2e3b<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Conclusion:<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Inflammation is now a validated, actionable target in cardiovascular prevention\u2014no longer secondary to cholesterol. With expanded biomarker testing, novel therapies, and imaging innovations, clinicians are encouraged to incorporate inflammation into routine risk assessment to enable earlier intervention and improved long-term outcomes.<\/div>\n
https:\/\/cardiovascularbusiness.us13.list-manage.com\/track\/click?u=ede357a4dde4e6d1363fede03&id=26d894d28f&e=e8ff1dad3e<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Summary: Inflammation Emerging as a Central Target in Cardiovascular Risk Assessment Source: Interview with Dr. Paul Ridker,Harvard Medical School & Brigham and Women\u2019s Hospital , announced on June 3, 2025. Background:\u00a0 Dr. Paul Ridker, a leading expert in cardiovascular prevention, holds the Eugene Braunwald Professorship of Medicine at Harvard Medical School\u2014an academic title named in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7645","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7645","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7645"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7645\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7646,"href":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7645\/revisions\/7646"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7645"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7645"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jordan-cardiac.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7645"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}