A Heart Drug That Costs Less Than Ten Cents A Day Cuts Hospitalizations By 25%

Digoxin is one of the oldest drugs in medicine. First extracted from the foxglove plant in 1785, used to treat heart conditions for over two centuries, and today costing less than ten cents a day. For decades it was a staple of heart failure treatment. Then newer, more expensive drugs arrived and digoxin quietly faded from use, but only about 15 percent of heart failure patients currently receive it. Three new studies published in Nature Medicine and JAMA, led by cardiologists at the University Medical Center Groningen, may be about to change that. Low-dose digoxin, added on top of the four standard heart failure medications, reduced hospitalizations by an average of 25 percent in a statistically significant finding that held up across a meta-analysis of thousands of patients. Deaths from cardiovascular disease and worsening heart failure also fell by 19 percent.

The researchers believe the findings could eventually influence heart failure treatment guidelines worldwide. Heart failure affects more than 64 million people globally and is one of the leading causes of repeated hospitalizations and healthcare costs. The low cost of digoxin is central to why the discovery matters so much, many modern heart failure medications cost several euros or dollars per day, making them inaccessible in lower-income settings. Digoxin is already available everywhere, in every country, at essentially no cost. A third study also found that patients who stopped taking digoxin experienced significantly more problems in the six weeks following discontinuation, which the researchers called both impressive and surprising. An ancient drug, a modern trial, and a finding that could help millions. Sometimes the old answers turn out to be the right ones.

Source:https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2026/08/260814235858.htm