A promising choice in hypertension treatment: Fixed-dose combinations

Obtaining the target blood pressure level by monotherapy can be challenging currently, especially for the patients who are suffering from other diseases meanwhile. It is demonstrated that a majority of hypertensive patients need two or more antihypertensive drugs to lower their blood pressure effectively. Consequently, fixed-dose which can be defined as that several active agents were combined in single pharmaceutical formulations appears to be a novel and underlying power in overcoming the cardiovascular disease. Based on the analysis of some literature and relative data from FDA, the advantages of fixed-dose combination are elucidated and formulations of common dual, triple-combinations were summarized. Clinical practices proved that fixed-dose combinations had many benefits comparing with single drug and separate agents in terms of effects, convenience, compliance, and costs to a certain extent. From the patients' perspective, the fixed-dose combination therapy will be increasingly utilized in blood pressure control in the future. (C) 2014 Shenyang Pharmaceutical University. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.