High blood pressure affects nearly 78 million Americans and is a major risk factor for heart disease and stroke. Of those who have high blood pressure, also called hypertension, about 80 percent are being treated but only half have it controlled to a healthy level in national surveys.
Today, the American Heart Association, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the American College of Cardiology issued a joint statement as a call to action for healthcare, industry and communities to prioritize people who are receiving treatment but are not currently at controlled levels. It notes that of those with uncontrolled hypertension, nearly 90 percent see a healthcare provider regularly, and 85 percent have health insurance.
Kaiser Permanente Northern California’s hypertension control program is cited as a model to emulate. The proportion of the health care system’s hypertensive patients meeting target blood pressure goals improved substantially from 44 percent in 2001 to more than 87 percent in 2011.
Kaiser Permanente’s regional hypertension program, serving more than 3 million members, was implemented using five major components: creation and maintenance of a health system-wide electronic hypertension registry; tracking hypertension control rates with regular feedback to providers at a facility- and provider-level, development and frequent updating of an evidence-based treatment guideline; promotion of single-pill combination therapies; and using medical assistants for follow-up blood pressure checks to facilitate necessary treatment intensification.
The statement says that programs are needed to develop and implement evidence-based treatment algorithms; establish systems that promote teamwork between patient, physician and other health care personnel; provide education and incentives for control; provide regular follow-up and treatment intensification as needed; provide actionable feedback to providers and health systems; maximize the use of technology; and promote a guideline-based simplified medication regimen.
The Kaiser Permanente Northern California hypertension control program was the subject of a study by the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research published in JAMA earlier this year. Read more about that study here.
