Non-haemodynamic anti-anginal agents in the management of patients with stable coronary artery disease and diabetes: A review of the evidence

Patients with coronary artery disease and concomitant diabetes mellitus tend to have more extensive vessel disease than non-diabetes mellitus coronary artery disease patients, are at high risk of adverse cardiovascular events and suffer from a great anginal burden. Very few trials have specifically addressed the issue of optimal anti-anginal therapy in coronary artery disease patients who also have diabetes mellitus. Among 'classical' anti-anginal agents, recent guidelines do not specifically recommend any molecule over others; however, European Society of Cardiology guidelines acknowledge that favourable data in patients with concomitant diabetes mellitus and coronary artery disease are available for trimetazidine and ranolazine, two anti-anginal agents with a non-haemodynamic mechanism of action. The aim of this article is to review available evidence supporting the anti-anginal efficacy of these two drugs in the difficult-to-treat population of diabetes mellitus patients, including their effects on glycated haemoglobin (HbA1c), a measure of medium-term glycaemic control. Although direct head-to-head comparisons have not been performed, available evidence favours ranolazine as an effective anti-anginal agent over trimetazidine in this population. In addition, ranolazine lowers HbA1c, indicating that it may improve glycaemic control in patients with diabetes mellitus. Conversely, scanty data are available on the metabolic effects of trimetazidine in this cohort of patients. Thus, ranolazine may represent a valuable therapeutic option in stable coronary artery disease patients with diabetes mellitus.