The Results of ACES (Antihypertensive Combinations' Long Term Efficacy Comparing Study): Analysis of Metabolic Effects of Antihypertensive Combination Therapies.

Background: More than 50 % of hypertensive patients have lipid disorders, and one-third of hypertensive patients have impaired glucose metabolism. Owing to the high prevalence of metabolic risk factors and/or comorbidities, antihypertensives with favorable or neutral metabolic effects are preferred. Based on the available evidence, diuretics and β-blockers are heterogeneous regarding their metabolic effects.

[The "blue man"].

The authors present the case of a 63-year-old man who was evaluated for symptoms of lung fibrosis, blue face and epithelopathy affecting both eyes. All these symptoms could be attributed to the adverse effects of amiodarone. Thyroid disorders, which are the most common side-effects of amiodarone treatment were absent.

Effects of hypertension therapy based on eprosartan on systolic arterial blood pressure and cognitive function: primary results of the Observational Study on Cognitive function And Systolic Blood Pressure Reduction open-label study.

Background: Recent studies have indicated a relationship between hypertension and cognitive function but therapeutic trials of antihypertensive therapy on the prevention of cognitive disorders have produced controversial findings.

Methods: The Observational Study on Cognitive function And Systolic Blood Pressure Reduction is an open-label trial in 28 countries designed to evaluate the impact of eprosartan-based therapy on cognitive function. The Mini-Mental State Examination was used as a global tool for the comprehensive assessment of cognitive function, with an intention to treat a cohort of 25 745 hypertensive patients aged at least 50 years during a follow-up interval of 6 months.

Possible therapeutic targets in cardiac myocyte apoptosis.

Since Kerr described programmed cell death (apoptosis) as a process distinct from necrosis, there have been many studies of apoptosis in disease, especially of immunological origin. Because cardiac myocytes are terminally differentiated cells, they have typically been assumed to die exclusively by necrosis. However, during the last decade this view has been challenged by several studies demonstrating that a significant number of cardiac myocytes undergo apoptosis in myocardial infarction, heart failure, myocarditis, arrhythmogenic right ventricular dysplasia, and immune rejection after cardiac transplantation, as well as in other conditions of stress.

[New medical therapies for the treatment of systolic heart failure].

Heart failure is characterized by sodium and fluid retention, sympathetic overactivation, parasympathetic withdrawal, vasoconstrictor activation and cytokine elevation. New therapies for heart failure attempt to control neurohormonal activation and limit progressive left ventricular dysfunction. Nesiritide (human B-type natriuretic peptide) is a recently approved new vasodilator that has been given to almost 1000 patients in numerous clinical investigations, it belongs to a new class of heart failure drugs known as natriuretic peptides.