Russian scientists attended the 28th European Meeting on Hypertension and Cardiovascular Protection

On 8-11 June, the 28^th European Meeting on Hypertension and Cardiovascular Protection was held in Barcelona. The key message was the overview of the current guidelines of ESH/ESC on hypertension management 2018. Plenary sessions devoted to the discussion of the guidelines were overcrowded. These long-awaited guidelines (in particular, after the American guidelines were published in 2017), despite the expectations, did not cause either an explosion or an earthquake: the European experts appeared to be more conservative leaving the definition and classification of hypertension without any change. At the same time the two-stage target blood pressure levels sound uncommon, and future practice will show how convenient and achievable they are. The main changes include the issues related to the antihypertensive treatment, in particular, in resistant hypertension, intervention approaches, compliance assessment etc. Consequently, the leading experts and the authors of the guidelines announced the main issues. Professor K. Narkiewiecz (Poland) declared the expert’s position regarding definition and classification of hypertension. Professor J. Redon (Spain) talked about the office and out-of-office blood pressure measurement. Professor Agabiti Rosei (Italy) noted changes in risk stratification. Professor L.M. Ruilope (Spain) listed the indications for the antihypertensive therapy initiation. Professor G. Mancia (Italy) presented new target blood pressure levels, professor A. Coca (Spain) – approaches to the life style modifications, professor B. Williams (Great Britain) – algorithm for the antihypertensive therapy administration. The current president of the European Society of Hypertension (ESH) professor K. Tsioufis (Greece) presented the current position on the intervention approaches in hypertension, while professor R. Schmieder (Germany) gave the expert opinion on the hypertension treatment in special groups. Professor Burnier (Switzerland) talked aout the patients follow-up. Professor G. Mancia concluded with the long list of open questions and gaps requiring further investigation. The number of these gaps is 4:1 compared to the recommendations and constitutes 26 questions. They are: What is the optimal blood pressure measurement method in atrial fibrillation? What is the optimal population-screening programme for detecting hypertension? What is the incremental benefit for the CV-risk prediction of the addition of out-of-office BP to office BP measurement? What are the outcome benefits associate with antihypertensive treatment in patients with resistant hypertension? What are the benefits of BP treatment for patients with BP in the high-normal range, in elderly and young patients, etc.?

Those who could not attend the Congress, had the opportunity to follow the Plenary Session and the Guidelines presentation on-line (the recording is available here: http://www.eshonline.org/esh-annual-meeting/; in Russian a brief overview of the key messages is published in the journal “Arterial Hypertension”, issue #3 and is available on the Journal web-site htn.almazovcentre.ru).

According to the statistical report made by the ESH president professor K. Tsioufis (Greece) doctors from 67 countries took part in the Congress. Altogether 1145 abstracts were accepted: Italy took the 1^st place (120 abstracts) followed by Russia (102 abstracts). Other countries followed far behind, including Spain, Greece, China etc. Besides common plenary sessions, satellite symposiums, breakfast sessions, the program included Topic Workshops, Joint sessions with other Societies, Teaching Seminars, Clinical Case sessions, Meet-the-Expert session, Hot Topic Sessions. In addition, the Balkan seminar, session of the Brazil Society of Cardiology, session of the Portuguese Society were held. Altogether, 178 oral presentation, 863 poster presentations and 71 oral presentations during the moderated poster sessions  were performed.  Russian specialists took an active part in the Congress giving 8 oral talks and 106 poster presentations (including joint studies with the international collaborators). However, none of the Russian specialists acted as a chairman during any of the sessions.

On the first day of the Meeting, the members of the ESH Task Forces briefly described the state-of-the art on the each filed in hypertensiology, i.e. device-based therapy in hypertension, management in acute stroke depending on the stroke subtype, treatment of the high-risk patients, patients with endocrine hypertensions, sexual dysfunction, cardiovascular prevention in the low resource settings etc.

Further, the most common topics were the antihypertensive drug and device-based treatment, personalized medicine, therapy in special groups (pediatrics, elderly patients etc.) and conditions, combination therapy. At the session of experimental studies and pharmacology Dr. N. Zvartau (St Petersburg) convinced the audience that the big data and their analysis is the basis for the precise and personalized medicine, as by models which include various individual parameters enable prediction of the response to the therapy, make prognosis etc.