Comparative pharmacodynamic evaluation of eptifibatide and tirofiban HCl in patients undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention (the TAM1 Study)

We performed a comparative analysis of platelet aggregation inhibition achieved with the glycoprotein IIb/IIIa inhibitors eptifibatide and tirofiban HCl in patients who underwent percutaneous coronary intervention and used light transmission aggregometric assays with d-phenylalanyl-l-prolyl-l-arginine chloromethyl ketone as an anticoagulant and 20 μmol of adenosine diphosphate as an agonist. Taking into account the differences in clinical efficacy of these 2 drugs in large trials investigating percutaneous coronary intervention, we hypothesized that the variable clinical effects might be related to variability in the magnitude and consistency of platelet aggregation inhibition achieved with dosing regimens of these glycoprotein IIb/IIIa inhibitors.