During 1995-2000 the prevalence of elevated blood pressure in patients with established coronary heart disease remained at an unacceptably high level. Throughout Europe, still about half of coronary patients require more intensive blood pressure management.

In 1978 a random sample (367 men and 568 women aged 18-65 years) taken from the general population of a north-eastern Italian town was screened for cardiovascular risk; 16 years later, the women were invited to a second screening. Three groups were identified at the initial screening (fertile, naturally menopausal and surgically menopausal) and four in the longitudinal study (137 remained fertile during the whole study, 205 became naturally menopausal, 56 were ovariectomised and 127 were already going through the menopause). The protocol included a questionnaire, blood pressure (BP) measurement, and blood exams. Continuous variables were adjusted for confounders. Systolic BP, prevalence of hypertension, cholesterol, glycaemia and uricaemia were similar, whereas diastolic and triglycerides (TG) were lower in surgically-menopausal than in fertile women (P Ͻ 0.001). No significant difference in 16 years' variation from baseline was observed between

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In the Region Veneto, north-eastern Italy, a survey of three random samples of population aged 20-64 has been made during the initial phase of the international cooperative pilot project called "Community Control Programme of Hypertension", promoted by World Health Organization. 15,187 subjects were examined (47.2% males). The prevalence of "isolated" systolic hypertension (ISH: "casual" blood pressure at or above 160 for systolic readings and below 95 for diastolic) was 6.2%, that of "isolated" diastolic (IDH) 9% and that of "simultaneous" systolic diastolic hypertension (SDH) 15.5%. ISH had an awareness rate of 29.4% and a treatment rate of 10.6%, which is less than for SDH but more than IDH. Analysis of the Hypertension Register set up in one of the three areas showed no important differences in heart rate, Body Mass Index, serum sodium or potassium, B.U.N. and total cholesterol between the different forms of hypertension. The assessment of coronary risk by means of Multiple Logistic Function yielded similar figures for ISH and SDH in males, higher figure for SDH in females. Electrocardiographic changes of left ventricular hypertrophy and of ischaemia were more frequent among subjects with ISH than those with SDH and IDH. It is concluded that ISH is present in a substantial proportion of the population and carries with it no less risk of cardiovascular complications than the other forms of hypertension.