Novartis announced that the Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) has adopted a positive opinion for Entresto(TM) (sacubitril/valsartan), marking an important milestone towards becoming available in the EU. Pending final approval by the European Commission (EC) Entresto, previously known as LCZ696, will be available for the treatment of adult patients with symptomatic chronic heart failure and reduced ejection fraction.
The CHMP's decision, which follows previous US and Swiss approvals, is based on results from the 8,442-patient PARADIGM-HF study in patients with HFrEF, which was stopped early when it was shown Entresto significantly reduced the risk of cardiovascular death versus ACE-inhibitor enalapril. At the end of the study patients who were given Entresto were more likely to be alive and less likely to have been hospitalized for heart failure than those given enalapril. Analysis of safety data showed that Entresto had a similar tolerability profile to enalapril.
Heart failure is a highly debilitating, life-threatening condition in which the heart cannot pump enough blood around the body because the muscles of the heart become too weak or too stiff to work properly. As a consequence patients face a high risk of death, repeated hospitalizations and symptoms such as breathlessness, fatigue and fluid retention that significantly impact quality of life. Even though millions live with heart failure most people fail to recognize the symptoms, meaning many are misdiagnosed or incorrectly attribute the signs to growing older.
