Colchicine may slow blood mutation, related CVD risk, reveals study

Those randomized to colchicine had a non-significant 6.3% annual increase in the number of overall mutated CH cells compared to a significant 14.9% increase in those taking placebo. Colchicine was associated with significantly attenuated clonal growth in TET2 CH, specifically, with a 9.1% annual increase in TET2 clone size in the colchicine group, compared with a 29.6% increase in the placebo group.

“These findings are striking in part because larger CH clones have been more strongly linked to both cardiovascular disease and cancer, and TET2 CH in particular has been consistently associated with increased cardiovascular risk,” said Michael Honigberg, MD, MPP, FACC, cardiologist at Massachusetts General Hospital and the study’s senior author. “Our study suggests that individuals with CH, especially TET2-mutated CH, may derive particular benefit from colchicine, including for cardiovascular risk reduction.”

In a second study published in JACC and being presented at ESC Conference 2025, researchers looked at whether CH’s relevance to cardiovascular disease risk decreased as women got older. Older adults have the highest risk of cardiovascular disease, and some previous studies have failed to demonstrate an association between CH and CVD after age 70.

Researchers in this study looked at over 6,600 women in the Women’s Health Initiative Long Life Study who had a median age of 80. They found that several CH subtypes (TET2, ASXL1, and JAK2) were associated with incident CVD, suggesting that CH remains associated with cardiovascular health into later life.

“Clonal hematopoiesis is emerging as a key link between aging, cardiovascular disease and cancer,” said Harlan Krumholz, MD, FACC, JACC Editor-in-Chief and Harold H. Hines Jr Professor of Medicine, Yale University School of Medicine. “This study advances our understanding of how inflammation and genetic changes in blood cells may shape cardiovascular risk, pointing to new opportunities for prevention and treatment.”

Reference:

Common inflammation drug may slow blood mutation, related CVD risk, Meeting: ESC Congress 2025.