January 13, 2021
Another randomized trial, REPLACE COVID, indicates that patients already taking ACE inhibitors and ARBs when they’re hospitalized for COVID-19 should continue to do so, supporting recommendations from international CV societies.
When it came to outcomes including all-cause death, duration of mechanical ventilation, time on renal replacement or vasopressor therapy, and multiorgan dysfunction during hospitalization, there were no differences between patients who continued versus discontinued their renin-angiotensin-aldosterone-system (RAAS) inhibitors after they were admitted, researchers report in a study published online last week in the
Lancet Respiratory Medicine.
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Considering these findings and those from the BRACE CORONA trial, presented last year at the virtual European Society of Cardiology Congress, the message is simple, according to senior author Julio Chirinos, MD, PhD (University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia). “In people who fall ill with COVID-19 requiring hospital admission, continuing these medications for established indications should be considered safe.”