Novel Approach Helps Control High Blood Pressure Better

High blood pressure levels can be controlled in patients with a novel multilevel, multicomponent approach that has physician- and non-physician-led interventions, reveals a new study.

The findings from a comparative effectiveness review are published in Annals of Internal Medicine.

Combination Therapy for High Blood Pressure

Anti-hypertensive agents are still the treatment drugs for hypertension but recent advances indicate that combination therapy may be a more effective form of treatment.

‘Multilevel and multicomponent strategies can reduce both systolic and diastolic pressure in patients with high blood pressure levels.’

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Hypertension is the leading risk factor for cardiovascular disease. Despite strong evidence that antihypertensive medications and lifestyle modifications reduce blood pressure and subsequent morbidity and mortality from cardiovascular disease, hypertension control rates hover between 25 and 40 percent, a rate that has remain unchanged for the past 40 years. As such, strategies are needed to increase control rates.

Researchers from Tulane University reviewed published research to assess effectiveness of eight implementation strategies for blood pressure control in adults with hypertension compared with regular care. They found that multilevel, multicomponent strategies, such as team-based care with medication titration by a nonphysician clinician, team-based care with medication titration by a physician, and multilevel strategies without team-based care, lead to reductions in systolic blood pressure of around 7, 6, and 5 mm Hg, respectively.

High Blood Pressure and Herbs

Drug intervention need not be the only option to help lower your moderately high blood pressure. Lifestyle changes along with herb remedies such as garlic, arjuna, sarpagandha, and olive can serve the purpose.

Patient-level strategies resulted in systolic blood pressure reductions of around 4 mm Hg for health coaching and 3 mm Hg for home blood pressure monitoring.

Trends were similar for diastolic blood pressure reduction.

According to the researchers, these findings provide evidence that multilevel, multicomponent implementation strategies are most useful and should be recommended in clinical practice and public health policy for hypertension control in communities.

Source: Eurekalert