Resistant Hypertension: Current Status, Future Challenges

Resistant hypertension in adolescents is increasing in frequency and is increasingly recognized as having significant short- and long-term health consequences. It may be seen in up to 30% of all hypertensive patients cared for. Adolescents with resistant hypertension are at higher cardiovascular (CV) risk due to a long history of severe hypertension complicated by other CV risk factors such as obesity. Common causes of resistant hypertension include primary aldosteronism, sleep apnea, diabetes and chronic kidney disease. Careful blood pressure (BP) measurement and thorough evaluation of patients with sustained BP elevation should make a possible early diagnosis of resistant hypertension. Successful treatment requires identification and reversal of life-style factors contributing to treatment resistant and diagnosis and appropriate treatment of causes of hypertension. Improved pharmacologic therapies may offer the potential for preventing or at least ameliorating early CV disease. This review highlights these and other important issues in the evaluation and management of adolescents with resistant hypertension and provides practical guidance to the practitioners involved in caring for such patients.