[How can primary prevention of coronary heart disease be improved in general practice?]

The basic issue of primary prevention strategies of coronary heart disease is an individually adapted cardiovascular risk factor management. However, transformation of these strategies by health care professionals is still insufficient, as was demonstrated by three studies performed in private practice.

In oral glucose tolerance tests performed in 234 patients with essential hypertension who were under regular medical control, 25.6% turned out to have previously unknown diabetes and 41.4% had impaired glucose tolerance. In the remaining 33.3% with normal glucose tolerance, mean total serum cholesterol was 260 mg/dl. 82 patients with essential hypertension and known diabetes had a mean total serum cholesterol of 276 mg/dl. Neither cohort was under lipid lowering drugs. Out of 290 unselected patients treated for type II-diabetes in private practice, 62% were hypertensive. Of those, hypertension was not known untreated or not sufficiently treated in 78.2%.

As a consequence, in patients at high cardiovascular risk, not only the "leading" disease (i.e. diabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidaemia), but also the concomitant constellation deserves attention and early intervention.