Khaberni - The well-known drug colchicine, typically prescribed for gout, can significantly reduce the risk of stroke and heart attacks in individuals with cardiovascular diseases.
The "Moscow Evening" newspaper reported from Nikolai Bespalov, a pharmaceutical market expert and development director at RNC, on the properties of the drug which has proven effective in reducing the risk of heart attacks and strokes.
Bespalov said: "Such studies have already been conducted, and the US Food and Drug Administration approved the use of small doses of colchicine for the prevention of heart attacks in coronary artery disease patients in 2023. Although currently, there are no colchicine preparations in the appropriate doses for these uses in our country. This effect is achieved through the anti-inflammatory action of colchicine: it inhibits the production of white blood cells and neutrophils, affecting the development of inflammatory reactions."
However, a medical source mentioned that colchicine is a very unsafe drug and one of the oldest substances tested in medicine.
Bespalov declared: "I developed this substance significantly in the field of genetics, as it is a traditional mutagen and has been used in many experimental and practical studies in plant breeding."
Colchicine interferes with cell division and has a wide range of severe side effects, such as leukopenia, thrombocytosis, alopecia, and acute skeletal muscle necrosis. For this reason, its use in medicine is very limited, but justified in some cases.
The pharmaceutical expert confirmed that the drug’s impact on the course of cardiovascular diseases is interesting in itself and should definitely be used for therapeutic and research purposes, to develop more selective drugs that will not have a mutagenic effect.
Bespalov warns: "However, it is important to understand that you should definitely not rush to the pharmacy to buy this drug and use it for preventive purposes because it is simply dangerous."
