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Background: Despite the chronicled success of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDLc)-lowering statin therapy, substantial residual cardiovascular (CV) disease risk remains a problem worldwide, highlighting the need to for combination therapies targeting non-LDLc factors, such as with fenofibrate., Methods/design: The STAFENO trial is a prospective, randomized, open-label, multi-center trial to compare the effect of statin plus fenofibrate with statin alone on the reduction and stabilization of plaque in non-diabetic, combined dyslipidemia patients with non-intervened, intermediate coronary artery disease (CAD) using virtual histology-intravascular ultrasound at 12 months. A total of 106 eligible patients are planned to be randomized to receive either a combination therapy (rosuvastatin 10 mg plus fenofibrate 160 mg/day) or monotherapy (rosuvastatin 10 mg/day) for 12 months. The primary endpoint of this study is the percentage change in the necrotic core volume. Secondary endpoints include changes in tissue characteristics and 1-year major CV events, including all-cause mortality, CV mortality, nonfatal myocardial infarction, stroke, and revascularization of the intervened and non-intervened lesions., Discussion: The STAFENO trial will address whether combination treatment of statin and fenofibrate has an additive beneficial effect compared to statin alone on the reduction and stabilization of plaque and CV events in non-diabetic, combined dyslipidemia patients with non-intervened intermediate CAD., Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT02232360. Registered 9 February 2014. https://register.clinicaltrials.gov/prs/app/action/SelectProtocol?sid=S0004ULE&selectaction=Edit&uid=U00023SZ&ts=2&cx=juppd2.

Pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) is known as one of diseases with the worst prognosis. Recently, targeted PAH drugs have been developed and approved for use; therefore, the treatment strategy and goals have changed, and the prognosis has improved over two decades. We reviewed the case of a female who showed the natural disease course of heritable PAH in treatment with the targeted PAH drugs under the Korean Health Insurance policy. At the age of 15, she visited the outpatient clinic for dyspnea on exertion that occurred 3 years ago. At that time, severe pulmonary hypertension was revealed by an echocardiography and there was no evidence of significant shunt lesion or embolism. After 4 years of loss to follow-up, her performance was WHO functional class III and she still suffered from dyspnea. The initial monotherapy using an endothelin receptor antagonist was started in 2008. After 2 years, BMPR 2 mutation was detected. Her clinical symptoms gradually worsened because of poor compliance. To escalate therapy, combination therapy was given, and finally, triple maximal therapy was maintained. The next step is to consider intravenous prostanoids. Various combinations of targeted therapy have been tried, and several trials have been confirmed that improve the prognosis. Initial upfront combination therapy and a more enthusiastic approach make good a better prognosis. In this area, active support of the government insurance policy is indispensable in Korea., Competing Interests: Competing interestsThe authors declare that they have no competing interests., (© The Author(s). 2019.)

Background: Pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) is a progressive, chronic disease without curative treatment. Large registry data of these patient populations have been published, although, phenotypic variants within each subtype of PAH have not been elucidated. As interest towards personalized medicine grows, the need for a PAH cohort with a comprehensive understanding of patient phenotypes through multiomics approaches, called deep phenotyping, is on the rise. The PAH Platform for Deep Phenotyping in Korean Subjects (PHOENIKS) cohort is designed to collect clinical data as well as biological specimens for deep phenotyping in patients with idiopathic PAH (IPAH) and heritable PAH (HPAH) in Korea., Methods: A total of 17 regional hospitals are currently working on enrolling up to 100 consecutive IPAH/HPAH patients for obtaining clinical data and biological specimens across Korea. The diagnosis of PAH is based on right heart catheterization. All clinical data is stored in a government-based online database. Each participating hospitals collect a whole blood sample from each patient, through which DNA, RNA, serum, plasma, and peripheral blood mononuclear cells will be extracted from the buffy coat layer for further multiomics analysis., Results: Not applicable., Conclusions: The PHOENIKS cohort is enrolling IPAH and HPAH patients across Korea to determine the prognosis and drug response in different phenotypic variant. The data generated by this cohort are expected to open new doors for personalized medicine in PAH patients of South Korea., Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT03933579. Registered on May 1st, 2019., Competing Interests: Competing interestsThe authors declare that they have no competing interests.