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Clinical characteristics of two groups commonly referred to an Irish hypertension service—patients with resistant hypertension and young adults with hypertension

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Abstract

Background

The management of hypertension is primarily performed in primary care settings in many health systems. However, two groups of patients often require specialist input: patients with resistant hypertension (RH) and young adults with hypertension.

Aims

To elucidate these groups by examining the characteristics of patients attending an Irish hypertension service, thus informing future management of hypertension.

Methods

Patients were recruited at consecutive hypertension clinics at St James Hospital, Dublin from July to September 2019. Following patient consent, patient data were recorded to identify patient characteristics as well as the results of investigations, blood pressure (BP) measurements and the anti-hypertensive treatment of the study participants which were then analysed.

Results

Two hundred thirty-six patients were included in the study. Compared to those without RH, the RH group were more likely to be obese (OR 2.59 [95% CI 1.06 to 6.33]), to have cardiovascular disease (OR 3.07 [95% CI 1.56 to 6.02]) and to have a non-dipping BP pattern (OR 3.86 [95% CI 1.57 to 9.47]).

Young adults comprised 27% of the cohort. Forty-seven percent of these patients were obese, 15.9% had hypertension in pregnancy and 22.2% had chronic headaches. Despite being prescribed less anti-hypertensives (1.41 vs 2.28; p < 0.05), the majority of young patients had a BP less than 140/90 mmHg, comparing favourably with older patients (OR 2.25 [95% CI 1.20 to 4.27]).

Conclusion

This contemporary study highlights the high prevalence of obesity among RH patients and young adults with hypertension. Findings suggest that programs to combat hypertension must include interventions to address obesity.

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Availability of data

The datasets generated during and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Code availability

Not applicable.

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Acknowledgements

The authors wish to acknowledge the input of the clinic nursing staff, in particular Ms Orlaith McNulty and Ms Linda Hemeryck, in facilitating the study.

Author information

Author notes

  1. John Stinson

    Present address: Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Trinity College, Dublin 8, Ireland

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Trinity College, Dublin 8, Ireland

    Cormac Kennedy, Richard Farnan, Patricia O’Connor, Martina Hennessy & Michael Barry

  2. St James Hospital, Dublin 8, Ireland

    Cormac Kennedy, Osama Ali, John Stinson, Ahmed Gabr, Mary Hall, Patricia O’Connor, Martina Hennessy & Michael Barry

  3. LEO Pharma, Dublin, Ireland

    John Stinson

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  1. Cormac Kennedy
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Contributions

Cormac Kennedy, Richard Farnan and John Stinson contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation and data collection were performed by all authors. Analysis was performed by Cormac Kennedy, Osama Ali and Richard Farnan. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Cormac Kennedy, Osama Ali and Ahmed Gabr. All authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Cormac Kennedy.

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Ethical approval was granted by the Tallaght Hospital Research Ethics Committee.

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Informed consent was sought and provided by all study participants.

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Informed consent was sought and provided by all study participants.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Kennedy, C., Ali, O., Farnan, R. et al. Clinical characteristics of two groups commonly referred to an Irish hypertension service—patients with resistant hypertension and young adults with hypertension. Ir J Med Sci 191, 2549–2557 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11845-021-02870-2

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