Long-term treatment with perindopril ameliorates dobutamine-induced myocardial ischemia in patients with coronary artery disease

The present study was designed to examine whether long-term blockade of angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) with perindopril ameliorates dobutamine-induced myocardial ischemia in patients with coronary artery disease (CAD). Twelve patients with proven CAD were randomly divided in two groups; one group received perindopril (8 mg/day, p.o.) for 3 months and another group served as a control. To evaluate anti-ischemic effects of perindopril, dobutamine stress echocardiography was performed before and 3 months after the treatment in a double-blind manner. Long-term treatment with perindopril significantly ameliorated the dobutamine-induced myocardial ischemia, as evaluated by time to the onset of symptoms, magnitude of electrocardiographic ST-segment changes, and left ventricular wall motion score (all P<0.05). The treatment significantly decreased serum ACE activities (P<0.01) and increased plasma bradykinin concentrations (P<0.05). The extent of reduction of left ventricular wall motion score by perindopril was closely correlated with that of inhibition of serum ACE activities (P<0.01) and with that of increase in plasma bradykinin concentrations (P<0.05). By contrast, no such beneficial changes were noted in the control group. These results provide the first evidence that long-term treatment with perindopril exerts anti-ischemic effects on the myocardial ischemia induced by increased myocardial oxygen demand in patients with CAD.