Professor Mark Caulfield gives insight into Hypertention treatments
February 4th, 2008
On 30 January 2008, Professor of Clinical Pharmacology - Mark Caulfield gave an insightful talk on Hypertension at London Medical. Professor Caulfield, who is the Director of the William Harvey Research Institute, has been on the steering group for 3 major Cardiovascular Outcome trials: ASCOT, Illuminate and Aviator and therefore was well qualified to present an interesting account of the current treatments available for different levels of hypertension and new emerging treatments.
The audience appreciated a detailed revision of the current hypertension management guidelines (JBS 2, 2005), including helpful tips regarding the ‘Class 4’ choice of therapy in the hard-to-control’ hypertensives. In the expert opinion, there is no lower limit in how far to drive the systolic blood pressure. In diabetes population, the targets are even stricter compared with general population
The event was well attended by consultants and local general practitioners who were very interested to hear about the potential introduction of the Polypill, currently on trial in the USA, which would alleviate patients from taking a large number of tablets per day. The evening ended with a questions and answer session where Professor Caulfield’s expert opinion on various patient cases was called upon. Finally, Professor Caulfield entertained the fascinated audience by quoting the beneficial blood pressure lowering effect from drinking 100ml of beetroot juice – a natural treatment option which would certainly get the approval by NICE for its cost-effectiveness, provided it would prove palatable enough for our patients to guarantee adherence.
