Clinical Alert from NHLBI

The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) issued a clinical alert on Friday, October 21, 2011:
Clinical Alert: Commonly Used Three-drug Regimen for Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis Found Harmful
NIH Stops One Treatment Arm of Trial; Other Two Treatments to Continue (http://www.nlm.nih.gov/databases/alerts/2011_nhlbi_ifp.html)

One arm of a three arm multi-center, clinical trial studying treatments for the lung-scarring disease idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) was stopped for safety concerns. The trial found that people with IPF receiving a currently used triple-drug therapy consisting of prednisone, azathioprine, and N-acetylcysteine (NAC) had worse outcomes than those who received placebos or inactive substances.