Cardiovascular Effects of Noncardiovascular Drugs

(Circulation. 2009;120:1123-1132.) © 2009 American Heart Association, Inc. Circulation is available at http://circ.ahajournals.org

Satish R. Raj, MD, MSCI; C. Michael Stein, MB, ChB; Pablo J. Saavedra, MD; Dan M. Roden, MD

Most drugs are not used to treat heart disease. However, such “noncardiovascular” medications can often have cardiovascular effects. In this review, we discuss some cardiovascular manifestations of drugs used for noncardiovascular indications. We discuss these in the text according to the manifestations with which patients present; selected drugs are listed in Table 1 by their indication/drug class. The same medication may appear in different sections, reflecting the varied cardiovascular consequences of a particular drug. We also discuss cardiovascular effects of noncardiovascular drugs that arise indirectly from drug interactions that cause an increase or decrease in the concentration of a cardiovascular drug./.../