title: Blood pressure control in Italian essential hypertensives treated by general practitioners.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Adequate control of blood pressure (BP) is limited worldwide. This has serious consequences for public health because in hypertensive patients, uncontrolled BP is associated with a higher incidence of cardiovascular events, particularly stroke. The aim of this study was to investigate BP control in a cohort of treated patients with diagnosed hypertension, who were under general practitioner care in Italy.
  
  
  METHODS
  Data were collected by 2,643 physicians on 8,572 individual Italian patients. Office BP was measured 5 min after seating each patient and then 3-5 min later. For each patient, data such as medical history of patients, physical examination data, antihypertensive drug usage, and self-BP measurement frequency were obtained.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Male prevalence was 48.4%, and mean age was 64.3 ± 10.5 years. Based on the second measurement, BP control (<140/90 mm Hg) was observed in 33.5% of all patients (34.2% in men and 33.4% in women). BP control was much lower for systolic BP than for diastolic BP (35.9 vs. 61.3%, P < 0.0001); moreover, BP control was much more common in patients who were engaged in self-BP measurement (61.2 vs. 38.8%, P < 0.0001). A stricter BP control recommended by the guidelines of the European Society of Hypertension (ESH) and European Society of Cardiology (ESC) (<130/80 mm Hg) was observed in only 5.5% of diabetic patients.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In treated Italian hypertensives effective BP control remains uncommon largely due to the failure to appropriately reduce the systolic BP. The stricter values recommended by the ESH/ESC guidelines for diabetic patients are achieved only by a small fraction of hypertensive diabetic population.
authors.affiliation: Clinica Medica, Milano-Bicocca University, Milan, Italy.
authors.forename: Cristina
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Giannattasio
authors.forename: Matteo
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Cairo
authors.forename: Francesca
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Cesana
authors.forename: Marta
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Alloni
authors.forename: Paola
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Sormani
authors.forename: Giulia
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Colombo
authors.forename: Guido
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Grassi
authors.forename: Giuseppe
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Mancia
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000959:Antihypertensive Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D001794:Blood Pressure / Q000187:drug effects*; D005260:Female; D058005:General Practitioners; D006801:Humans; D006973:Hypertension / Q000188:drug therapy*; D007558:Italy; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged
chemical_list: D000959:Antihypertensive Agents