Many treatments are available to help heart disease patients manage their disease. People who have many risk factors for heart disease or who already have a heart disease diagnosis should try to limit their risk factors. Several drugs are also available to help manage the factors that contribute to heart disease.

Cholesterol lowering drugs

These drugs help lower LDL cholesterol and raise HDL and include the drugs known as statins. They work by lowering the amount of cholesterol produced and released by the liver (statins), by blocking absorption of cholesterol from food in the small intestine (cholesterol absorption inhibitors), by causing greater release of cholesterol in bile (resins), or by changing the production of blood fats in the liver (niacin).

Blood pressure lowering drugs

Several classes of drugs help lower blood pressure in different ways. Diuretics cause increased elimination of water and sodium through the urine which lowers the blood pressure by reducing blood volume. ACE (angiotensin-converting enzyme) inhibitors and angiotensin II receptor antagonists are vasodilators that reduce blood pressure by opening blood vessels wider and allowing blood to flow more easily. Alpha and beta blockers reduce the heart rate and the output from the heart, thus reducing blood pressure.

Anti-clotting drugs

Drugs that help prevent blood clots can help reduce the risk of heart attack. These include aspirin and warfarin that thin the blood as well as several anti-platelet drugs that limit the effects of these clotting agents. Thrombolytics are clot-busting drugs given in the hospital to heart attack and stroke patients to help dissolve the clot that is causing arterial blockage.

Antiarrhythmia drugs

Antiarrhythmia drugs help keep abnormal heart rhythms under control. All of them work by affecting ion channels in the heart muscle cell membrane. There are sodium channel blockers, calcium channel blockers, potassium channel blockers and beta blockers.

Drugs that treat heart failure

For severe heart failure, therapy with inotropic drugs that help the heart beat with more force may be needed when other treatments no longer work. Sometimes called heart pump drugs, these medications must be delivered by intravenous infusion.