Two Deaths from Natrecor Study Reported Three Years Later

FREMONT, Calif. - A 3-year-old study on Scios Inc.'s Natrecor heart drug recently reported two deaths which were not included in the study's initial report.

Scios, a Johnson & Johnson company, said on Jan. 3 that it submitted an interim report to the Food and Drug Administration detailing its ongoing expanded analysis of the Proaction study (Prospective Randomized Outcomes Study of Acutely Decompensated Congestive Heart Failure Treated Initially in Outpatients with NATRECRO), which compared Natrecor (nesiritide) to a placebo. The report includes the recently reported deaths that had occurred within 30 days after treatment with Natrecor.

'The two new cases …