Are polypills and population-based treatment the next big things?

Cardiovascular disease (CVD), such as heart attack and stroke, is a leading cause of death and disability in the US. High blood pressure and high cholesterol are major risk factors for CVD, and even though they are quite common and highly treatable, they tend to be undertreated. This is especially true among those who are poor or members of a minority. It’s estimated that thousands of lives could be saved each year if more people with high blood pressure and high cholesterol received treatment for these conditions. The appeal of the polypill One reason that high blood pressure and high cholesterol are poorly treated is that medications prescribed to treat them aren’t reliably taken as prescribed (the common medical expression for this is poor medication adherence). Among the most important reasons for this are that these conditions usually cause no symptoms, it’s hard to remember to take multiple medications or multiple doses of medications each day, medications may cause side effects, and they may be expensive. One potential way to improve medication adherence is to combine one or more medications into a single pill, or polypill. Advantages to this approach include: Lower doses of each medication may be needed, possibly reducing the incidence of troublesome side effects. Multiple medications (in low doses) may be more effective than higher doses of a single medication. Fewer doses are easier to remember. Depending on the specific medications and doses, a polypill coul...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Drugs and Supplements Health Heart Health Hypertension and Stroke Source Type: blogs