Daily Medication Pearl: Pravastatin Sodium (Pravachol)

Medication Pearl of the Day: Pravastatin Sodium (Pravachol)

Indication: Pravastatin sodium (Pravachol) is an HMG-CoA reductase inhibitor (statin) indicated as an adjunctive therapy to diet to lower the risk of myocardial infarction, revascularization, and cardiovascular mortality in hypercholesterolemic patients without clinically evident congenital heart disease.

Insight:

• Dosing: For adults, the recommended starting dose is 40 mg once daily. Use 80 mg dose only for patients not reaching LDL-C goal with 40 mg. For significant renal impairment, the recommended starting dose is 10 mg once daily.
• Dosage forms: Tablets 10 mg, 20 mg, 40 mg, 80 mg.
• Adverse events: In short-term clinical trials, the most commonly reported adverse reactions (≥2% and > placebo) regardless of causality were musculoskeletal pain, nausea/vomiting, upper respiratory infection, diarrhea, and headache.
• Mechanism of action: Pravastatin is a reversible inhibitor of 3-hydroxy-3-methylglutaryl-coenzyme A (HMG-CoA) reductase, the enzyme that catalyzes the conversion of HMG-CoA to mevalonate, an early and rate limiting step in the biosynthetic pathway for cholesterol. In addition, pravastatin reduces VLDL and TG and increases HDL-C.

Source: Pravachol Label (fda.gov)