During the ESC 2012 in Munich, Germany, Professor Paul M. Ridker from Harvard Medical School, Boston, US, discussed the therapeutic implications of vascular inflammation, focusing on the CV reduction trials, including JUPITER, and two new and ongoing trials CIRT and CANTOS.

“In 1997 we knew we would have to start the cardiovascular prevention trials,” he says. “We needed to know if inflammation would be part of our armamentarium against cardiovascular disease.” Subsequent research established inflammation as a crucial component in CVD.

“If as a clinician you choose not to monitor inflammation and CRP, that’s fine,” he adds. “But you cannot walk away from this discussion without understanding that inflammation is crucial to the biology of this disease.”