Amlodipine/Valsartan (Avsar®): Efficacy in Hypertensive Patients - A Real World Observational Study (ALERT)

Hypertension is a significant public health problem and one of the major noncommunicable diseases at the endemic level in Pakistan. This study was done to determine the efficacy of amlodipine/valsartan (Aml/Val) once-daily dose in reducing blood pressure (BP) after eight weeks of therapy.

This study is an open-labeled observational study carried out for a period of 12 months. Some 769 participants of either gender between the ages of 18 and 70 years selected after taking written informed consent had a BP of >139/89 mmHg (not controlled) on monotherapy with a minimum 30 days of treatment. Therapy to control their high BP was initiated with Aml/Val (Avsar^®, PharmEvo Pvt Ltd, Karachi, Pakistan) at the time of their enrolment in the study. Pregnant females and patients with secondary hypertension were excluded. Data were analyzed using SPSS version 20.0 and chi-square test was used for inferential analysis. p-values less than 0.05 were considered significant.

At the end of week one, less than half of the patients achieved the desired level of BP while the majority achieved this level by the end of the study. Some 75.6% patients achieved targeted BP with Aml/Val 80/5 mg tablet, 18.5% achieved targeted BP with Aml/Val 160/5 mg tablet, and 5.9% achieved the targeted BP with Aml/Val 160/10 mg tablet at the end of the eighth week. The compliance rate was 99.2% at the first week, 98.9% at the fourth week, and 99.9% at the eighth week of treatment.

Our study concluded that Aml/Val (Avsar) combination therapy was very effective in controlling BP among patients who were uncontrolled with other monotherapies for at least one month.