TY  -  JOUR
AU  -  Strocchi, Enrico
AU  -  Baffoni, Laura
AU  -  Bragagni, Alessio
AU  -  Soldati, Mario
AU  -  Borghi, Claudio
T1  -  The attention on gender in studies on the treatment of hypertension: was it enough?
PY  -  2021
Y1  -  2021-05-01
DO  -  10.1723/3600.35813
JO  -  The Italian Journal of Gender-Specific Medicine
JA  -  Ital J Gender-Specific Med
VL  -  7
IS  -  2
SP  -  94
EP  -  101
PB  -  Il Pensiero Scientifico Editore
SN  -  2612-3487
Y2  -  2026/05/04
UR  -  http://dx.doi.org/10.1723/3600.35813
N2  -  Summary. Hypertension is an important cardiovascular risk factor, and its treatment is undoubtedly effective in reducing the incidence of cardiovascular and renal events in both sexes, as also reaffirmed by the most recent ESC-ESH guidelines. Our knowledge of the hypertension therapy derives from the evidence generated by a large number of controlled clinical studies carried out over the last decades; however, the authors of these studies did not always evaluate the results obtained separately for males and females. After examining the major controlled clinical studies in the field of hypertension therapy, mentioned in the guidelines, our study found that the analysis of the results had taken account of sex in 21 out of 33 cases only. The most recent meta-analyses – which in some cases concern hundreds of thousands of subjects – were then evaluated, noticing that only in a small minority of cases did the analysis of the results take sex into consideration as a variable; significant problems, such as the treatment of hypertension in the elderly or the pressure levels to be reached with treatment, have never been evaluated from a gender perspective. The study does not demonstrate the existence of gender differences, because this was not its objective, but from an extensive analysis of the literature it concludes that the existence of possible gender differences in the context of high blood pressure therapy is not being sufficiently investigated yet.
ER  -