Oral Nitrates: Efficacious?

Excerpt

To the editor: Last spring an article (1) on the oral nitrate medications for treatment of angina pectoris was published in the Wall Street Journal. The article discussed studies purporting to show that there is "no rational basis" for this treatment, which is generally accepted by the profession as safe and effective. In these studies, nitrates injected into the hepatic portal veins of rats were metabolized by the liver before they reached the heart. Since the appearance of this article, with reports and press releases distributed by various medical groups, angina patients across the country have begun to question their