CARDIOME ACQUIRES ARTESIAN THERAPEUTICS

Cardiome Pharma Corp. (NASDAQ: CRME/TSX: COM) announced today that it has completed the acquisition of Artesian Therapeutics, Inc., further to the letter of intent ("LOI") announced on August 29, 2005. Artesian was founded in March of 2002 to discover and develop bi-functional small-molecule drugs for the treatment of cardiovascular disease, and currently has two advanced small molecule discovery programs in the area of congestive heart failure ("CHF").

PR Newswire (http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/10-24-2005/0004193198&EDATE=)