Bimagrumab showed no meaningful heart changes in older adults
After six months, the share of blood ejected per heartbeat differed by 2.0 percentage points from placebo, without a clinically relevant change.
Our read
Interventions- Studied:
- Randomized trial in healthy older men and women, 6 months of treatment, against placebo (Double-blind, placebo-controlled)
- What changed:
- Heart muscle mass did not differ meaningfully with bimagrumab versus placebo (mass index difference: 1.6 g/m2)
- The catch:
- Twenty-two participants discontinued, leaving cardiac safety results vulnerable to dropout bias
- Stake:
- Authors work for Novartis, which develops bimagrumab.
- In the record:
- The 14th paper on bimagrumab with results in people; 37 on record in all. Its result on lean body mass agrees with all 4 other findings on record.
Editor of record: Boris Djordjevic · AgingResearch.News
Sixty-eight healthy, community-living men and women aged 60 to 86 received bimagrumab or placebo in a randomized, double-blind trial. Bimagrumab was given intravenously at 10 milligrams per kilogram every four weeks for six months.
Heart scans showed no clinically relevant differences between groups in the muscle mass of the heart’s main pumping chamber, adjusted for body size, or the fraction of blood it ejected per beat. For the pumping fraction, the range of likely effects included no difference. Lean body mass, used as an estimate of skeletal muscle mass, rose 5.5% with bimagrumab, while fat mass fell 14%; neither changed with placebo. Muscle spasms occurred in 57.1% of the bimagrumab group and 6.1% of the placebo group. Most adverse events were mild or moderate.
Why it matters
Muscle preservation during weight loss is a concern for older adults. The authors supported considering bimagrumab alongside drugs that mimic the hormone glucagon-like peptide-1, which may cause excess muscle loss.
Caveats
Only 49 of 68 participants completed six months of treatment. Participants had normal baseline heart measurements, and people with a history of heart attack were excluded, limiting application to people with heart disease.
From the paper
- Participants
Sixty-eight participants were randomly assigned to either bimagrumab (n = 35, 13 men and 22 women) or placebo (n = 33, 13 men and 20 women; ).
- Who took part
Therefore, the present study was undertaken to answer key questions of cardiovascular safety with extended exposure to bimagrumab in healthy older adults.
- Ages
Men and women aged 60 to 86 years with a body mass index (BMI; body weight in kg/height in meters squared) of 18 to 34 kg/m², LVMI (left ventricular mass in grams/body surface area in meters squared) < 115 g/m² (men) and <89 g/m² (women), and LVEF ≥55% were enrolled.
- Duration
This study included monthly intravenous (IV) dosing over 6 months with bimagrumab 10 mg/kg or placebo, and a safety follow-up period of up to 5 additional months.
- Result
The between-treatment difference of −2.64 kg (95% CI −4.11, −1.17) at 6 months was statistically significant (P <.001).
- Limitation
This was a small study performed at a single site with a relatively homogeneous population of healthy older adults, which may limit the generalizability of the findings.
- Left ventricular mass index
The reductions in LVMI observed at 6 months did not differ by treatment (P =.148).
- Left ventricular ejection fraction
Changes in left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) within and between groups were not clinically relevant or statistically significant at any timepoint.
- Lean body mass
As anticipated, total LBM increased over the 6-month treatment period in the bimagrumab group, while it remained constant in the placebo group.
- Fat mass
Conversely, total body fat mass in the bimagrumab-treated group declined from baseline by −6.4 [6.9] % at 3 months and −14.0 [8.9] % at 6 months (both P <.001), resulting in corresponding changes in fat mass of −1.6 [1.7] kg at 3 months and −3.5 [2.1] kg at 6 months.
Quoted word for word from the full text on PubMed Central.
The paper
Translational Medicine
The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism, Mar 24, 2026, Open access
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