A randomized, double-blind, double-dummy study comparing a fixed dose combination of telmisartan 80 mg plus hydrochlorothiazide 12.5 mg to telmisartan 80 mg in Chinese hypertensive patients who failed to respond adequately to telmisartan 80 mg / 中华心血管病杂志

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To evaluate the efficacy and safety of a fixed dose combination of telmisartan 80 mg plus hydrochlorothiazide (HCTZ) 12.5 mg (TH) to telmisartan 80 mg (T) in Chinese patients who failed to respond adequately to treatment with T.</p><p><b>METHOD</b>This is a multi-center, randomized, double-blind, double-dummy clinical study. A total of 699 eligible hypertensive patients entered a one-week screening phase prior to the eight-week open-label T period. At the end of eight weeks, 345 patients who failed to respond to T (DBP > or = 90 mm Hg, 1 mm Hg = 0.133 kPa) were randomized to receive either TH (175 patients) or T (170 patients) for another eight weeks. Sitting and standing BP were taken 24 hours post-dose and adverse events were documented at visit with 4 weeks interval. Laboratory, ECG and physical examination were performed at screening, at baseline and at the final visit.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>After 8 weeks treatment, (1) The mean trough reduction in sitting diastolic blood pressure (SiDBP) from baseline in TH group was greater than that in T group (10.1 mm Hg vs 7.7 mm Hg, P = 0.0017). The mean trough reduction in sitting systolic blood pressure (SiSBP) from baseline was 14.2 mm Hg in TH group and 7.4 mm Hg in T group (P < 0.0001). (2) The mean trough reduction in standing DBP and standing SBP from baseline were significantly greater in TH group (8.7 mm Hg and 12.9 mm Hg) compared those in T group (7.3 mm Hg and 7.0 mmHg, P = 0.0350, P < 0.0001). (3) The number and percentage of responders in TH group (129, 74.6%) were significantly higher than in T group (100, 59.2%, P = 0.0016). (4) The incidence of the study drug-related adverse events was similar between TH and T group (3.5% vs. 3.6%, P > 0.05).</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>TH was more effective than T in patients not responded adequately to T in Chinese hypertensive patients.</p>

Retrospective analysis of drug treatment on inpatients with chronic heart failure / 中华流行病学杂志

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To investigate drug treatment of inpatients with chronic heart failure(CHF) during the past 30 years in some areas and to provide more information on the treatment strategy of CHF.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>In two centers a retrospective study was conducted. All data were taken from the hospitalized cases with chronic heart failure. The medication distributions in different decade, gender, age heart function grade and etiology were analyzed.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>5189 cases were enrolled with the ratio of male to female as 1:1.02. The mean age was (62.93 +/- 13.49) years old. The general causes of chronic heart failure were as follows: coronary heart disease (44.2%), rheumatic heart disease (24.1% ) , pulmonary heart disease (19.0%) and cardiomyopathy (4.8%). The admission cardiac function was mostly seen as grade NYHA IlI and IV, and their proportions were 40.6% and 44.5%. Major medication would include nitride (80.0%), diuretics (71.8% ), digitalis (68.1% ), angiotensin conversion enzyme inhibitors (ACEI) (52.2% ) and beta-blockers (19.5% ) etc. Moreover the frequency of above used medication was essentially increasing decade by decade. The major drug treatment of pulmonary heart disease also included diuretics, nitride, digitalis. ACEI was more commonly used in male than in female cases. The frequency of ACEI and ARB were more commonly used in the group > or = 60 years old than that in the group < 60 years old. The administration frequency of beta- blockers had no significant difference among different age and sexes.</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>The conventional drugs such as nitride, diuretics, digitalis were still dominated the treatment of CHF. Although the administration frequency of ACEI and beta-blockers increased quickly, there had been a great gap between the optimal medical strategy and clinical practice in the management of CHF. Data showed the treatment strategy was changing.</p>

Comparable analysis of in-hospital mortality in patients with acute myocardial infarction / 中华心血管病杂志

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To investigate the change of the mortality of AMI and influence factors within 20 years.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>Clinic data of 134 AMI patients from 1980 to 1983, 354 AMI patients from 1990 to 1993 and 817 AMI patients from 2000 to 2003 were comparably analyzed.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>In hospital mortality of AMI was 22.4% from 1980 to 1983, 14.4% from 1990 to 1993 and 9.2% from 2000 to 2003, respectively (P < 0.01). The decrease of in-hospital mortality in male was more significant than in female (P < 0.01). The corresponding factors for decrease of mortality were younger than 60 years old, first onset of AMI, successful rescue of cardiac arrest and reperfusion management of infarction relative artery. The disadvantage factor was female.</p><p><b>CONCLUSIONS</b>Improvement of medical and reperfusion management of AMI conduced in significant decreases of hospital mortality.</p>