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NVS > New Novartis drug may upend heart failure treatment

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/novartis-drug-may-upend-heart-144128147.html

BARCELONA, Aug 30 (Reuters) - A new medicine from Novartis could replace drugs that have been central to treating heart failure for a quarter of century, after proving remarkably effective in reducing deaths in a keenly awaited study.

The experimental treatment, known at LCZ696, cut the risk of both cardiovascular death and admissions to hospital by a fifth, boosting hopes for a product seen as a multibillion-dollar seller - thanks, in part, to its expected premium price.

"Given the survival advantage of LCZ696 over currently available drugs, once this drug becomes available, it would be difficult to understand why physicians would continue to use traditional (drugs) ... for the treatment of heart failure," said Milton Packer of the University of Texas.

Packer was joint-principal investigator on the study with John McMurray of the University of Glasgow, who called the result "astonishing".

There has been little progress for more than a decade in treating chronic heart failure, in which the heart fails to pump enough blood around the body, so there is excitement about the new medicine among both doctors and investors.

The study, comparing LCZ696 to an older drug already known to improve survival, was stopped early five months ago because the benefit to patients was overwhelmingly positive - but the size of the effect was only disclosed on Saturday at the annual meeting of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC), the world's largest cardiology congress.

ESC officials flagged the PARADIGM-HF trial as a highlight of the five-day event in Barcelona and Piotr Ponikowski of the Medical University of Wroclaw, who was not involved in the trial, urged a fast-track review of treatment guidelines given the "striking" finding.

Novartis is looking to LCZ696 to revive its fortunes as the blood pressure pill Diovan faces generic competition. As a result, the data on the product is widely viewed as the most important catalyst for the stock over the remainder of 2014.

"This result is better than we ever could have anticipated," the company's pharmaceuticals head David Epstein told Reuters.