07 March 2003
The increased use of an expensive drug has helped a campaign to cut the number of deaths from coronary heart disease, the national heart director said this week.
Launching a progress report on the implementation of the National Service Framework on heart disease, a ten-year modernisation plan published in 2000,
Dr Roger Boyle said the prescription of statins had risen by 30% each year.
More than a million people were now taking the drugs, saving up to 6,000 lives a year, he added.
Primary care trusts do not doubt the benefits of statins but they say these are one of the main reasons for overspends on their drugs budgets. Spending on statins now stands at £546m, almost £230m a year more than it was three years ago.
Boyle said the extra spending was worth it.
Bruce Keogh, secretary of the Society of Cardiothoracic Surgeons, said the NSF was working. 'It is invigorating to work in an environment where waiting lists are plummeting; where the number of trainees in cardiac surgery has doubled; and where the results for heart surgery continue to improve.'
PFmar2003
