Does fixed-dose combination antihypertensive therapy improve blood pressure goal attainment and reduce adverse events compared to monotherapy in hypertensive patients?
Fixed-dose combination therapies for hypertension offer greater blood pressure lowering efficacy and fewer adverse events compared to monotherapy, supporting their use to achieve BP goals.
BACKGROUND: The attainment of clinical blood pressure (BP) goals can markedly reduce cardiovascular morbidity and mortality, yet approximately two-thirds of treated hypertensive patients in the United States have uncontrolled BP. Consequently, more aggressive management of hypertension, frequently involving combination therapy (e.g., fixed-dose combination FDC therapy), is needed to achieve the recommended BP goals of 3000 patients, CCB + ARB combination therapy was associated with significantly lower incidences of headache and peripheral edema than CCB monotherapy. CONCLUSION: Guidelines for hypertension management clearly support the greater use of multidrug therapy, especially in high-risk patients. FDCs (e.g., various emerging CCB/ARB combinations) are a valuable option for such high-risk patients, as these combinations offer the potential to reduce adverse events, increase compliance, lower treatment costs, and improve BP goal-attainment rates.
Joel M. Neutel (Wed,) studied this question.