Impact of Hypertension on Global Cardiovascular Risk Stratification: Analysis of a Large Cohort of Outpatient Population in Italy

Abstract

Background: Control of hypertension remains a major unmet need, worldwide. Hypothesis: To test whether the presence of hypertension may improve global cardiovascular (CV) risk stratification and achievement of therapeutic targets for CV risk factors in adult outpatients in Italy. Methods: Physicians were asked to submit data covering the first 10 consecutive adult outpatients. All data were centrally analyzed for global CV risk assessment and rates of control of major CV risk factors, mostly blood pressure (BP) levels, in different high-risk subgroups of hypertensive patients. Results: Overall, 1078 physicians collected data of 9864 outpatients (46.7% females, age 66.1 ± 10.3 years) with valuable data on BP levels, among which 7147 (72.5%) had a diagnosis of hypertension and 2717 (27.5%) were normotensive subjects. Hypertensive patients were older and had a higher prevalence of major risk factors, including smoking, obesity, dyslipidemia, and family history of cardiovascular disease, as well as comorbidities, than did normotensive subjects (P < 0.001 for all comparisons). Despite worse control of BP (66.9% vs 36.2%, P < 0.001), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (40.5% vs 37.4%, P < 0.005), triglycerides (72.1% vs 67.8%, P < 0.001), and fasting plasma glucose (71.2% vs 67.0%, P < 0.005), hypertension was associated with larger availability and frequency of diagnostic examinations and greater use of antihypertensive, glucose-lowering, and lipid-lowering drugs, as well as antiplatelet agents, compared with normotension (P < 0.001). Conclusions: Presence of hypertension significantly improved clinical data collection and CV risk stratification. Such an approach, however, was not paralleled by better control of major CV risk factors. IntroductionUncontrolled hypertension remains a major problem for health care systems worldwide, being strictly related to a persistently elevated burden of cardiovascular (CV)

Inflammatory residual risk: An emerging target to reduce cardiovascular disease?

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Prevalence, Treatment, and Associated Factors of Hypertension in Spain: A Comparative Study between Populations

“…In fact, diuretics occupied the fourth hypertension treatment position in the PRESCAP study in 2002 (prescribed in 10.6 % of men and 18.8 % of women), while eight years later, in the PRESCAP 2010 study, a downward trend in the prescription of diuretics as monotherapy was highlighted (7.3 % in men and 17.2 % in women) [ 31 ]. Angiotensin converting enzyme drugs were the second more prescribed pharmacologic group class after diuretics in our population, although these drugs are already the first therapeutic prescribed class in other studies [ 24 , 29 ].…”

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Achievement of multiple therapeutic targets for cardiovascular disease prevention: Retrospective analysis of real practice in Italy

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