ARE ALL ANTIHYPERTENSIVE DRUGS “IMPOTENT”?
O P Kapoor Ex. Hon. Physician, Jaslok Hospital and Bombay Hospital, Mumbai, Ex. Hon. Prof. of Medicine, Grant Medical College and JJ Hospital, Mumbai 400 008. Hypertension is the most common diagnosis made by the GP and the patient is sentenced to life time drug therapy on a single reading of the blood pressure! This is very unfortunate for the patient. I want to draw the attention of the doctors that in my opinion, most of the drugs used in the treatment of hypertension are impotent. I see many doctors doubling the dose of the drugs and adding 2 or 3 drugs, trying to control the BP without reducing the weight of the patient or the sodium intake or the alcoholic intake and without advising a brisk walk daily to reduce the BP (with so much faith in these drugs). In my practice I do not trust 100% in drugs which are introduced to me to lower the BP in a hypertensive patient. Thus I use any drug which comes to my pen in any dose as long as the patient follows other instructions mentioned
