Intermediate- to long-term amiodarone use safe and may not increase mortality risk in AF patients
Israel: Low-dose amiodarone in the contemporary atrial fibrillation (AF) population was associated with a lower risk of all-cause mortality in the absence of a substantial increase of interstitial lung disease (ILD) and primary lung cancer (PLC) risk, a nationwide Israeli study has shown.
"Constant exposure to low-dose amiodarone was associated with a trend towards increased ILD risk (15%-45%) but a clinically negligible change in absolute risk (maximum of 1.8%), no increased PLC risk, and a lower risk of all-cause mortality," reported Gal Tsaban, University of the Negev Beersheva, Israel, and colleagues.
The findings published in European Heart Journal highlight the safety of intermediate- to long-term amiodarone use, without evidence of increased mortality risks.
Amiodarone-related interstitial lung disease is the most severe adverse effect of treatment with amiodarone. Most studies on amiodarone-related ILD are derived from periods when amiodarone was given at higher doses than currently used. Therefore, the research team aimed to determine the association between constant exposure to low-dose amiodarone and the risk of ILD, PLC, or all-cause mortality among contemporary AF patients. For this purpose, they conducted a nationwide population-based study among patients with incident atrial fibrillation between 1999 and 2021.
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