A world integrated health care leader has published the results of the study on improving the control of hypertension and achieving normalization goal earlier (I-change Study). The observational study results were published in Modern Medicine Middle East edition and shared Saudi physicians.

The study that was conducted in Saudi Arabia focused on uncontrolled hypertensive patients who were following a mono-therapy treatment option. After changing the treatment strategy for the 1,288 participating patients (by adding another anti-hypertension medication or by giving them a fixed combination of medications) it was found that 62.7 percent of those patients had reached their normalized blood pressure rate, that is 120/80.

It was also observed that 82.1 percent of the non-diabetic patients participating in the study had shown a notable improvement in their blood pressure, while only 37.3 percent of the total diabetic patients had shown improvement in normalizing their blood pressure.

Dr. Hesham Yehia, consultant cardiologist at Erfan Hospital in Jeddah, said: “Hypertension is a major public health issue as this silent killer is one of the leading causes of death globally and hypertension patients are at high risk of developing cardiovascular diseases, especially in the Kingdom where the average of hypertensive Saudis is estimated at 20 percent.

In addition to hypertension, the silent killer, smoking, diabetes, obesity, hereditary factors are also leading causes of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, renal morbidities and mortalities.”

Dr. Salah Mousa, Sanofi Saudi Arabia GM, stated: “By sharing the (I-change Study) results with the medical community in the Kingdom, treating physicians will have better control and insight of their treatment strategy, and how to help their patients normalize their blood pressure and avoid life threatening/fatal complications associated with high blood pressure.”