Blood pressure drugs had greater benefits with higher adherence
Compared with comparison groups, treatment lowered systolic blood pressure by 5.2 mm Hg with higher adherence and 3.0 mm Hg with lower adherence.
Limit: Adverse events were not reported, leaving treatment harms out of the benefit assessment
Edited by Boris Djordjevic · AgingResearch.News
A meta-analysis of 12 randomized trials involving 115,389 participants found greater benefits from blood pressure medication with higher adherence. Researchers had repeated adherence measurements for 91,339 participants from nine trials. They defined higher adherence as taking at least 80% of medication as assigned and updated adherence groups at each follow-up visit.
Over a median follow-up of 4.7 years, researchers recorded 15,460 major cardiovascular events. For major cardiovascular disease, hazard ratios—a measure of relative event rates over time—were 0.89 with higher adherence and 1.01 with lower adherence, each against comparison groups. The range of likely values for the lower-adherence estimate included no difference. Treatment also lowered systolic blood pressure—the top number in a blood pressure reading—more with higher adherence.
Why it matters
Preventing cardiovascular disease is relevant to healthy aging. The authors emphasized long-term strategies to help people take medication as assigned and realize the full benefits of blood pressure treatment.
Caveats
The analysis compared randomized treatments within adherence groups, rather than randomly assigning adherence. This congress abstract did not report participants’ ages, medication doses or adverse events.
- Antihypertensive therapy
- Medication adherence
- Systolic blood pressure
- Major cardiovascular disease
- Heart failure
- Humans
The paper
University of Oxford
ESC Congress 2026 Abstract, Oct 26, 2026, Open access
Presented at ESC Congress 2026
