EFFECTS OF ENALAPRIL MALEATE ON SURVIVAL OF DOGS WITH NATURALLY ACQUIRED HEART-FAILURE

Objective-To test the long-term effect of enalapril maleate treatment on progression of clinical signs of heart disease in dogs with moderat e or severe naturally acquired heart failure associated with chronic d egenerative mitral valvular disease (mitral regurgitation [MR]) or dil ated cardiomyopathy (DCM). Design-Prospective multicenter study. Anima ls-110 dogs enrolled at 15 locations in the United States. Procedure-A ll dogs enrolled in this study were maintained on their randomly alloc ated treatment regimen until death, treatment failure (deterioration o f condition requiring additional medication), or termination of the st udy. All dogs entered in the study received standard heart failure tre atment (furosemide with or without digoxin). Statistical analysis (log -rank test) was performed to compare the distribution of number of day s in the study between dogs that received placebo tablets and dogs tha t received enalapril tablets. Results-When dogs with MR and DCM were g rouped together, mean number of days until treatment failure was signi ficantly different between those receiving enalapril and those given p lacebo tablets (157.5 and 77.0 days, respectively). For dogs with MR, mean number of days until treatment failure was significantly differen t between those receiving enalapril and placebo tablets (159.5 and 86. 6 days, respectively). Mean number of days until treatment failure amo ng dogs with DCM receiving enalapril and placebo tablets was 142.8 and 56.5, respectively. Clinical Implications-Use of enalapril in combina tion with standard treatment (diuretics with or without digoxin) appea rs to be beneficial over an extended period, compared with standard tr eatment alone.