PRAZOSIN IN HYPERTENSION WITH HEART-FAILURE

Prazosin, in daily doses of 6-16 mg, was used along with furosemide and polythiazide in 11 hypertensive heart failure patients. Average supine and standing blood pressures were reduced from 180/108 and 171/106 to 130/84 and 135/86, respectively. Average heart rate decreased from 83 to 73 supine and from 84 to 75 standing. Changes in the indices of cardiac function-including the ejection fraction, ejection time, and apical indices-each indicated improvement of left ventricular function. Thus prazosin along with diuretic agents may be particularly useful in the treatment simultaneously of heart failure and of elevated blood pressure with few side effects. © 1979 Raven Press, New York.