Therapeutic appropriateness of antihypertensive treatments leads to greater sustainability

Cardiovascular disease emerges as one of the leading causes of death and hospitalizations in the Western world. For many years, a number of drugs have been on the market, in well-established and safe use for antihypertensive therapy. The various classes of antihypertensives in established use include, ACE inhibitors, as monotherapy or in combination with diuretics or calcium antagonists, the sartans, calcium antagonists, beta blockers, and diuretics. Among these drug classes there are differences in mechanism of action, efficacy in reducing blood pression, tolerability, and cost. In fact, there are wide differences in the monthly cost of therapy within each class and among the classes themselves. In this analysis we describe the prescribing trend for antihypertensives in the local healt agency Naples 3, describing aspects of pharmacoeconomics, pharmacoutilization, and pharmacological differences.