Hypertensive Emergencies

HYPERTENSION rarely constitutes a medical emergency. Ideally, the hypertensive patient is detected early, and his hypertensive mechanisms are characterized and corrected by appropriate, orally active drugs. Titration of dosage against blood-pressure response and adverse drug effects should usually take several weeks of ambulatory observation. Rapid normalization of blood pressure is unnecessary, often uncomfortable and sometimes hazardous.Systematic, gradual institution of antihypertensive therapy is impossible in untreated or poorly treated hypertensive patients who present as hypertensive emergencies. These crisis situations constitute failures of medical care and have become gratifyingly less common during recent years. They are life-threatening disorders usually characterized by . . .