UMPIRE - Use of a Multidrug Pill In Reducing Cardiovascular Events

Overview

People with established cardiovascular disease need secondary prevention that addresses multiple risk factors. Complexity \& cost confer particularly difficult barriers to uptake of treatment; recovery from a stroke or heart attack typically necessitates multiple drugs for cholesterol, blood pressure and platelet function. A low-cost, fixed-dose, once-daily combination polypill, the Red Heart Pill, has been formulated by Dr Reddy's Laboratories. UMPIRE will evaluate whether provision of this polypill compared with usual medications improves adherence and clinical outcomes among high-risk patients in Europe and India. The results will be used to develop recommendations for equitable access.

The UMPIRE trial has been modelled on similar trials running concurrently in Australia and New Zealand. The design is straight forward in making comparisons between cardiovascular preventative therapy delivered as a polypill (the Red Heart Pill) on the one hand, and as separate component multiple tablets (usual care) on the other hand. In both groups (the polypill group and the usual care group,) the GP or managing physician will be able to adjust or add additional medications as appropriate to meet the targets for control of blood pressure, cholesterol and other risk factors as directed by local or national guidelines. The Primary endpoint - adherence to prescribed cardiovascular preventative medication at the end of the trial follow-up - will be evaluated by self reported use of anti-platelet, statin and blood pressure lowering therapy. This evaluation will be supported by the recording of blood pressure and cholesterol levels, and measuring the differences between the two groups at the end of the trial. Treatment allocation is open label - both investigator and subject will know which arm of the study they are on. Patients will be identified and recruited from GP surgeries or hospital clinics, and also via local advertisement. Recruitment into the study is planned to start in Summer 2010 with a 12 month recruitment phase. Recruited subjects will spend between 12 - 30 months (average 18 months) being followed up. The target study population is 1000 patients in European at sites in London, Dublin and Utrecht; and 1000 subjects in India at approximately 30 sites. Subjects will be randomly allocated to receive either the "polypill" or "usual care". If allocated to the polypill group, the study investigator will decide on the version of polypill to be prescribed, and adjust any current medications as necessary. If the subject is in the "usual care" group, they will be seen as needed by their usual doctor between study visits, and continue on their current medicines. Participants will have at least 5 study visits, but no more than 8 study visits, and these visits include registration, randomisation and follow-up visits at 1 month, 6 months, and 12 months, and depending on when the subject is recruited to the study, study visits at 18 and 24 months/end of trial visit. A substudy, PESCA (Protocol ID CR01656, NCT01326676), will be performed in the European participants to assess whether the polypill reduces progression of atherosclerosis. This will be assessed by measuring carotid intima-medial thickness and central systolic blood pressure using the PulseCor device. A second substudy, INPUT, is a process evaluation involving qualitative interviews of a sample of health practitioners and trial participants at the end of the trial (summer 2012) in London and India.