[Calcium antagonists: accounts on new perspectives of their use and an update on side effects]

Although calcium antagonists are drugs which have been introduced relatively recently, their use is already so widespread, at least in the treatment of cardiovascular diseases as to represent one of the main therapies for diseases such as ischaemic cardiopathy, arterial hypertension, and, to a lesser extent, arrhythmias. Together with the development of clinical applications, deeper insight has been gained into the clinical and experimental pharmacology of these drugs. The authors of this review concentrate their attention on some of the less frequently discussed aspects of calcium antagonists. On the one hand, they describe some "nonprimary" uses of these drugs, both in the cardiovascular and in other therapeutic fields, which already receive confirmation from relatively solid experimental data. On the other hand, they review the side effects and some pharmacological interactions of calcium antagonists, both of which should be held in due consideration, seeing that these drugs are widely employed in clinical practice and their use often requires prolonged, intensive treatment. The most common side effects are described, together with others relatively less well known ones, and outline is given of potential undesirable effects on the cardiovascular as well as on other systems.