Cost-effectiveness of Hypertension Treatment Based on the Measurement of Ambulatory Blood Pressure

In recent years soaring medical costs have become a major social problem in developed countries. Ambulatory blood pressure (ABP) measurements have a stronger predictive power for cardiovascular events than clinic blood pressure (CBP) measurements. Therefore the introduction of ABP measurement for the diagnosis and treatment of hypertension should lead to a decrease in medical expenditure. This study presents calculations of the cost saving and life years associated with changing from CBP to ABP measurement as diagnostic tool. We constructed a Markov model using data from the Ohasama study and a Japanese national database. Study population was 7.042 million individuals aged 40 years and above living in Japan. The introduction of ABP for hypertension would result in a reduction of about 9.48 trillion yen per 10 years. We conducted a sensitivity analysis and found that the introduction of ABP was associated with at least a cost reduction of 47500 billion yen. But it did not provide significant extension of average life years. However the introduction of ABP for hypertension treatment would be a very effective method in perspective of public health because it reduced about 59600 individuals of stroke and about 18900 individuals of death. Given its cost-effectiveness, extensive application of ABP measurement in clinical practice is expected.