Can people with dilated cardiomyopathy without symptoms stop taking their medication?

Is it safe to withdraw medical therapy from patients with a previous diagnosis of dilated cardiomyopathy, now in remission? (Dr Brian Halliday)

Supervised by Dr Sanjay Prasad, this Clinical Research Training Fellowship asks if it is safe to stop medication in people who have recovered from the heart muscle disease dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM). In DCM the heart doesn’t pump correctly and the pumping chambers increase in size, causing heart failure and sometimes sudden death. In around a third of patients, heart function improves with medication, and often patients want to know whether they can stop taking medication when their heart function is back to normal. In this project, the researchers will study 50 people with DCM whose heart function has recovered and who now have no symptoms. They will conduct a clinical trial in which patients will be randomly split into two groups. One group will continue heart medication whereas the other group will gradually stop their medications. The participants in the trial will be closely monitored for six months using blood tests, exercise tests and heart MRI scans. Doctors will review them frequently and the patients will restart medication if their condition worsens. After six months the groups will be compared and determine how many stopped medications safely and how many relapsed. This research could lead to a larger study looking at weaning people with DCM off heart medication in the long term, improving their wellbeing and reducing health care costs.