Hypertension and Organ Damage

A Case-Based Guide to Management

This book is designed to assist physicians in choosing among diagnostic procedures and therapeutic options when caring for patients with hypertension and markers of organ damage. The comprehensive description of practical clinical cases sets this book apart from other publications and will help the reader to transfer general guideline recommendations to the clinical setting. With this purpose, the cases have been selected to reflect situations frequently encountered during clinical routine, rather than hypertensive crises or emergencies or the rare presentations that tend to be addressed in case reports in scientific journals. The scenarios considered include treated hypertension with uncontrolled blood pressure levels in patients with left ventricular hypertrophy, diastolic dysfunction, carotid atherosclerosis, microalbuminuria and renal impairment, proteinuria and renal disease, and abnormal pulse pressure. By representing clinical practice in a “real world” setting, these paradigmatic cases will enable the practitioner to select the diagnostic tools and form of treatment best suited to the individual patient and the particular cardiovascular risk profile, thereby optimizing outcomes.