Results of a trial using an intensive, 4-year program aimed at blood pressure lowering showed that intervention reduced not only blood pressure (BP), but also significantly reduced the risk of total dementia over that period.
All-cause dementia, the primary outcome, was significantly reduced by 15% in the intervention group compared with usual care, and cognitive impairment no dementia (CIND), a secondary outcome, was also significantly reduced by 16%.
"Blood pressure reduction is effective in reducing the risk of dementia in patients with hypertension," concluded Jiang He, MD, PhD, professor of epidemiology and medicine and director of Tulane University's Translational Science Institute in New Orleans, Louisiana. "This proven, effective intervention should be widely scaled up to reduce the global burden of dementia."
He presented these results from the China Rural Hypertension Control Project (CRHCP) November 11 at the American Heart Association (AHA) Scientific Sessions 2023 in Philadelphia.
Target Organ Damage
Keith Ferdinand, MD, also from Tulane University, commented on the findings during a press conference at the meeting. This result "opens our opportunity to recognize that the target organ damage of hypertension also now includes dementia," he said.
The researchers were able to "rigorously lower blood pressure from 157 to 127.6 in the intervention, 155 to 147 in the controls — 22 mg Hg — and if you look at the
