The Cochrane Column

Chronic hypertension is a common problem which can lead to serious side effects in long run. Considering the size of disease burden and variety of patients, different drug classes are in use to treat it. The most commonly used medications to treat hypertension are “angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitors, (ACE inhibitors)” and “angiotensin receptor blockers, (ARBs).” Different ACE inhibitors and ARBs are available in the market. Two recent Cochrane reviews have addressed the efficacy of these classes of drugs in reducing blood pressure (BP) as well as comparing various drugs in each category with each other. The following are summaries of these two studies.