Characterization, therapeutics and control of arterial hypertension in patients of pharmacies from Vila Nova de Famalicão

Arterial Hypertension (AHT) is one of the most concerning health issues worldwide, due to its importance as a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases (CVD). Objectives: Determine the proportion of AHT, characterize the disease, therapeutics and related factors on users of 2 Pharmacies of Vila Nova de Famalicão city. Materials and Methods: It was performed a descriptive and correlational cross-sectional study included 352 users of 2 Pharmacies from Vila Nova de Famalicão. The data was collected using a questionnaire and an automatic blood pressure (BP) measuring device. Results and Discussion: The proportion of self-reported HTA was 34.4%, mostly in older age groups (66.7% and 82.4% for users with 62-72 and 84-95 years, respectively). Moreover, an important amount of hypertensive users didn’t have their BP values controlled, with values of 38% and 49% for high diastolic and high systolic BP, respectively. Concerning the pharmacological treatment, 24.8% of the hypertensive users do not take medication, most of them due to the lack of symptoms (44.2%). Diuretics were the medicines more used in AHT therapeutics (19.9%) followed by Angiotensin-Converting-Enzyme (ACE) inhibitors (14.9%), which is according to the Portuguese treatment guidelines. Some risk factors identified as associated with AHT were the age (p<0.001), Body Mass Index (BMI) (p=0.001), CVD factor history [stroke (p<0.001), heart attack (p=0.001), dyslipidemia (p<0.001), diabetes (p=0.001)] and family history of AHT (p