• Marc S Sabatine, Robert P Giugliano, Stephen D Wiviott, Frederick J Raal, Dirk J Blom, Jennifer Robinson, Christie M Ballantyne, Ransi Somaratne, Jason Legg, Scott M Wasserman, Robert Scott, Michael J Koren, Evan A Stein, and Open-Label Study of Long-Term Evaluation against LDL Cholesterol (OSLER) Investigators.
• From the Thrombolysis in Myocardial Infarction (TIMI) Study Group, Division of Cardiovascular Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, and the Department of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston (M.S.S., R.P.G., S.D.W.); the Carbohydrate and Lipid Metabolism Research Unit, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg (F.J.R.), and the Division of Lipidology, Department of Medicine, University of Cape Town, Cape Town (D.J.B.) - both in South Africa; the Departments of Epidemiology and Medicine, College of Public Health, University of Iowa, Iowa City (J.R.); the Sections of Cardiovascular Research and Cardiology, Department of Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine, and the Center for Cardiovascular Disease Prevention, Houston Methodist DeBakey Heart and Vascular Center, Houston (C.M.B.); Amgen, Thousand Oaks, CA (R. Somaratne, J.L., S.M.W., R. Scott); Jacksonville Center for Clinical Research, Jacksonville, FL (M.J.K.); and the Metabolic and Atherosclerosis Research Center, Cincinnati (E.A.S.).
• N. Engl. J. Med.. 2015 Apr 16;372(16):1500-9.

BackgroundEvolocumab, a monoclonal antibody that inhibits proprotein convertase subtilisin-kexin type 9 (PCSK9), significantly reduced low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol levels in short-term studies. We conducted two extension studies to obtain longer-term data.MethodsIn two open-label, randomized trials, we enrolled 4465 patients who had completed 1 of 12 phase 2 or 3 studies ("parent trials") of evolocumab. Regardless of study-group assignments in the parent trials, eligible patients were randomly assigned in a 2:1 ratio to receive either evolocumab (140 mg every 2 weeks or 420 mg monthly) plus standard therapy or standard therapy alone. Patients were followed for a median of 11.1 months with assessment of lipid levels, safety, and (as a prespecified exploratory analysis) adjudicated cardiovascular events including death, myocardial infarction, unstable angina, coronary revascularization, stroke, transient ischemic attack, and heart failure. Data from the two trials were combined.ResultsAs compared with standard therapy alone, evolocumab reduced the level of LDL cholesterol by 61%, from a median of 120 mg per deciliter to 48 mg per deciliter (P<0.001). Most adverse events occurred with similar frequency in the two groups, although neurocognitive events were reported more frequently in the evolocumab group. The risk of adverse events, including neurocognitive events, did not vary significantly according to the achieved level of LDL cholesterol. The rate of cardiovascular events at 1 year was reduced from 2.18% in the standard-therapy group to 0.95% in the evolocumab group (hazard ratio in the evolocumab group, 0.47; 95% confidence interval, 0.28 to 0.78; P=0.003).ConclusionsDuring approximately 1 year of therapy, the use of evolocumab plus standard therapy, as compared with standard therapy alone, significantly reduced LDL cholesterol levels and reduced the incidence of cardiovascular events in a prespecified but exploratory analysis. (Funded by Amgen; OSLER-1 and OSLER-2 ClinicalTrials.gov numbers, NCT01439880 and NCT01854918.).

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