Assessment of potential cardiotoxic side effects of mitoxantrone in patients with multiple sclerosis – an interim analysis after five years

Introduction: Several studies have shown that mitoxantrone (mitox) may have beneficial effect on the course of disease in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS). There is, however, concern that its potentially cumulative cardiotoxic side effects may cause cardiomyopathy, reduced left ventricular (LV) ejection fraction (EF), and irreversible congestive heart failure (CHF). Therefore the aim of this study was to investigate cardiac side-effects by repetitive monitoring. Methods: In this prospective study 73 patients with a rapidly deteriorating primary (PP) or secondary (SP) progressive MS or a severe relapsing-rem…