Effects of blood pressure-lowering drugs in heart failure: A systematic review andmeta-analysis of randomized controlled trials
Pinho-Gomes AC., Azevedo L., Bidel Z., Nazarzadeh M., Canoy D., Copland E., Salam A., Rodgers A., Kotecha D., Rahimi K.
We aimed to combine evidence from all heart failure trials that have investigated the effects of drugs with blood pressure (BP)-lowering properties to assess the extent to which such drugs reduce BP in heart failure, the association between the net change in BP between treatment arms and cause-specific outcomes and whether treatment effects (efficacy and safety) vary according to baseline BP. We conducted a systematic review and metaanalysis including randomized clinical trials of drugs with BP-lowering properties in patients with chronic heart failure with at least 300 patient-years follow-up. We included a total of 37 trials (91 950 patients) and showed that treatment with drugs with BP-lowering properties resulted in a small but significant decrease in SBP in patients with heart failure with no evidence that the efficacy and safety of those drugs varied according to baseline BP.