PROFILE OF ANTIHYPERTENSIVE DRUGS IN HYPERTENSIVE PATIENTS ON RENAL REPLACEMENT THERAPY (RRT)

Hypertension is frequently observed in end-stage renal failure. We ana lysed the incidence and severity of hypertension as well as antihypert ensive treatment in a large group of patients on renal replacement the rapy (RRT). Questionnaires were sent to all 49 dialysis centers caring for a total of 2090 patients on RRT in Austria. Hypertension was clas sified as mild, moderate or severe according to WHO criteria. 22 dialy sis centers returned completed questionnaires accounting for 1087 pati ents on RRT. Of these 653 (60%) patients were hypertensive; 425 (39%) patients had mild or moderate, while 228 (21%) patients had severe hyp ertension. Patients with mild or moderate hypertension need on average 1.5, while those with severe hypertension on average 3.3 antihyperten sive drugs. Calcium antagonists were the antihypertensive drugs most f requently administered, in 71% of the patients, followed by ACE inhibi tors, alpha-and beta-blockers. Despite multidrug antihypertensive ther apy severe hypertension is still a serious problem in patients on RRT. Tassin's center experience showed that longer dialysis time normalize s hypertension and reduces the requirement of antihypertensive treatme nt in patients on hemodialysis.