(MarketWatch.com) — Despite ongoing medical care, an alarming 65 percent of people with ‘treatment-resistant’ hypertension reported in a new survey that high blood pressure remains their most serious health concern, and 79 percent of the respondents said they need new treatment options to get their dangerously high blood pressure under control.
Treatment-resistant hypertension, defined as persistently high blood pressure despite treatment with three or more antihypertensive medications, poses a serious health threat to nearly 100 million people worldwide.[i], [ii]
The survey was conducted by Harris Interactive with more than 4,500 high blood pressure patients worldwide as the first step in a global health campaign called ‘Power Over Pressure,’ which is endorsed by both the European Society of Hypertension (ESH) and the American Society of Hypertension, Inc. (ASH).
The survey, supported by Medtronic, Inc., also found that people with treatment-resistant hypertension are extremely worried about their overall health. Two-thirds (67 percent) of the respondents described their overall health as ‘fair or poor,’ despite the fact that most people with treatment-resistant hypertension reported being under the care of either a general practitioner (70 percent) or a cardiologist (25 percent).
A team of global hypertension experts have reviewed the findings of this global survey. In response, the group is launching Power Over Pressure to raise awareness of the challenges faced by the nearly 100 million people worldwide who are living with treatment-resistant hypertension. The campaign aims to educate and empower patients and physicians to finally take control of this challenging disease. More information about the campaign is available online at www.poweroverpressure.com .
Power Over Pressure is chaired by two world-renowned hypertension experts: Suzanne Oparil, M.D., professor of medicine, physiology and biophysics, and director of the vascular biology and hypertension program in the division of cardiovascular disease at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, in the United States; and Roland E. Schmieder, M.D., professor of internal medicine, nephrology and hypertension and head of the clinical research center hypertension and vascular medicine at the department of nephrology and hypertension of the University Hospital Erlangen, in Germany.
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