Vioxx Linked to Increased Heart Attack Risk

Merck Funded Study

In October 2003 researchers first presented their finding that Vioxx may increase the risk of heart attacks in patients during their first 90 days of taking the pill.

The study, from Harvard University-affiliated Brigham & Women's Hospital in Boston, was funded by Merck, the manufacturer of Vioxx.  The study found an increased risk of heart attack, or acute myocardial infarction, compared with patients taking Celebrex, manufactured by Pfizer. One of the researchers for this study was Carolyn C. Cunnuscio, a Merck epidemiologist.

Eric J. Topol, of the Cleveland Clinic, and one of the authors of a landmark medical-journal article which first raised the Vioxx-related heart attack issue, called the research "the best study to date." The new study, Dr. Topol said at the time of release, "greatly substantiates our concern about the cardiac side effects."  Dr. Topol observed that the possible cardiac effects of Vioxx appear "worse with the higher doses."

Merck immediately discounted the study's findings - as they had done with Dr. Topol's article when it was published in August 2001 in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).

In fact, Merck later went so far as to remove the name of the Merck epidemiologist, Ms. Cunnuscio, from an article wherein the October 2003 findings were published. This article, which appeared in the April 14, 2004 issue of the medical journal Circulation, stated that people taking Vioxx had a 24% increased risk of heart attack compared with patients taking Celebrex or nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs). The article's conclusion - that Vioxx "was associated with an elevated relative risk of acute myocardial infarction [heart attack]" - was the same as the findings which the study's researchers, including Merck's epidemiologist, had presented in October 2003. But when the April 2004 Circulation article was published, Ms. Cunnuscio's name was missing from the list of researchers involved with the underlying study.

Upon learning that Merck had removed their employee's name from the Circulation article, the current JAMA editor, Catherine DeAngelis expressed her disappointment, and rounded-off her comments by saying "Aren't they seeking truth?"

Read more on our Vioxx Information Page >>