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Hershel Jick, MD

JAMA. 2000;283:1738-1740.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

An association between appetite-suppressant medications and cardiac valve disorders is now generally believed to have been established, but remains an important scientific and clinical issue. Even though the 2 most commonly implicated agents, fenfluramine and dexfenfluramine, were withdrawn from the US market in 1997 and despite the recent multibillion dollar class action settlement by the manufacturer of these drugs,¹ ongoing research continues to attempt to more accurately and more completely characterize the pathophysiology and natural history of anorexigen-associated valvular heart disorders. However, the totality of the evidence to date favoring a causal connection between fenfluramines and cardiac valve disorders is persuasive, if somewhat complex.

In the initial 1997 report of cardiac valvular abnormalities associated with appetite-suppressant drugs, Connolly et al² described 24 patients who had developed symptomatic heart valve disorders in the absence of preexisting conditions after receiving phentermine and fenfluramine. The patients had moderate to severe . . . [Full Text of this Article]

Author Affiliation: Department of Medicine, Boston University School of Medicine, Lexington, Mass.

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