Overview
Cardiovascular Relevance and Clinical Frame
Inflammation becomes clinically consequential in cardiovascular care when a short lived repair response fails to resolve or when it is sustained within an arterial plaque.
Inflammation becomes clinically consequential in cardiovascular care when a short-lived repair response fails to resolve or when it is sustained within an arterial plaque. Atherosclerosis is therefore more than lipid accumulation: the arterial wall contains ongoing immune signalling, and the IL-1β → IL-6 → CRP axis contributes to atherothrombotic events even when lipid levels are controlled. This is the cardiovascular lens for the molecular sequence that follows. hs-CRP is a risk-enhancement tool, not a stand-alone diagnosis. In adults at intermediate 10-year ASCVD risk, hs-CRP ≥2.0 mg/L may help inform whether preventive lipid-lowering should be initiated or intensified after the clinical context is considered. It should not be used to label an acutely ill patient with vascular inflammation without assessing infection, tissue injury, and other causes of elevation. Anti-inflammatory treatment sits beside—not instead of—LDL-lowering and antithrombotic therapy. In Canada, Myinfla (colchicine extended-release 0.5 mg) is approved as add-on therapy to reduce atherothrombotic events in adults with existing coronary artery disease. That does not justify automatic treatment immediately after MI: CLEAR-SYNERGY found no reduction in its composite cardiovascular outcome when colchicine was...