Luis A. García Rodríguez and Antonio González-Pérez from the Centro Español de Investigación Farmacoepidemiológica in Madrid, Spain, studied NSAID use in 4,975 patients who had had a heart attack and 20,000 healthy control individuals. Their results show that taking NSAIDs for less than a year does not increase the risk of heart attack. Regular NSAID use for longer than one year, however, can increase the risk of non-fatal heart attack by 20%. The authors analysed the heart attack risk associated with three of the most commonly used NSAIDs. Their results show that individual NSAIDs have different cardiovascular effects. Taking ibuprofen for over a year does not increase the risk of heart attack, while long-term diclofenac use causes a small increase in the risk of having a heart attack. Long-term use of naproxen could have a small protective effect according to this study.
Article:
Long-term use of traditional non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and the risk of myocardial infarction in the general population Luis A Garcia Rodriguez and Antonio Gonzalez-Perez
BMC Medicine 2005, 3:17 (28 November 2005)
BMC Medicine