Clinical characteristics and management of hypertense patients diagnosed of heart failure in primary health care in Spain.: HICAP Study

Objective. To know the proportion of hypertensive patients with heart failure and its treatment in Primary Health Care. Methods. Observational, multicenter study conducted in Primary Health Care. The sample selection technique was a non-probabilistic selection of consecutive cases. Hypertensive patients with blood test and electrocardiogram performed in the last 6 months were included in this study. Results. A total of 1288 physicians who included 6719 patients participated in the study. Only 6375 were considered valid. The proportion of patients diagnosed of heart failure was 18.9%. In 39% of the cases, the diagnosis was made in Primary Health Care and 57.5% of the patients had undergone an electrocardiography. A total of 76.7% of the patients were functional class I-II and 36.1% had systolic dysfunction. Follow-up was performed in 33.6% of cases only in Primary Health Care. Seventy-seven percent of the patients were not treated with beta blockers and 11% did not take renin-angiotensin system blocker drugs. Conclusion. The proportion of hypertensive patients diagnosed of heart failure is high but their diagnostic management and therapy does not seem to be appropriate.