gms | German Medical Science

29. Wissenschaftlicher Kongress der Deutschen Hochdruckliga

Deutsche Hochdruckliga e. V. DHL ® - Deutsche Hypertonie Gesellschaft Deutsches Kompetenzzentrum Bluthochdruck

23. bis 25.11.2005, Berlin

Are Loop Diuretics or Thiazides the Diuretics of Choice in Elderly Patients in Congestive Heart Failure?

Meeting Abstract

  • B. Zegenhagen-Phiong - Berlin-Chemie AG, Medizin & Forschung, Berlin (Berlin, D)
  • A. Lichtenthal - Berlin-Chemie AG, Medizin & Forschung, Berlin (Berlin, D)
  • A. Marx - Berlin-Chemie AG, Medizin & Forschung, Berlin (Berlin, D)
  • S. Tegeler - Berlin-Chemie AG, Medizin & Forschung, Berlin (Berlin, D)
  • R. Agrawal - Berlin-Chemie AG, Medizin & Forschung, Berlin (Berlin, D)

Hypertonie 2005. 29. Wissenschaftlicher Kongress der Deutschen Hochdruckliga. Berlin, 23.-25.11.2005. Düsseldorf, Köln: German Medical Science; 2006. Doc05hochP144

Die elektronische Version dieses Artikels ist vollständig und ist verfügbar unter: http://www.egms.de/de/meetings/hoch2005/05hoch144.shtml

Veröffentlicht: 8. August 2006

© 2006 Zegenhagen-Phiong et al.
Dieser Artikel ist ein Open Access-Artikel und steht unter den Creative Commons Lizenzbedingungen (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/deed.de). Er darf vervielfältigt, verbreitet und öffentlich zugänglich gemacht werden, vorausgesetzt dass Autor und Quelle genannt werden.


Gliederung

Text

Objective: Thiazides are considered beneficial in the elderly suffering from congestive heart failure (CHF), even though they often are associated with side-effects like hypokalemia. For loop-diuretics like torasemide, a well tolerated high-ceiling long-acting loop-diuretic, the positive correlation of therapeutic benefit with high age has not been shown up to date. We, therefore, investigated the influence of age on the therapeutic response of torasemide in CHF.

Methods: In this multicenter observational open label study in an outpatient setting, 2,878 patients suffering from cardiovascular diseases (median age 68.3 years, 53.4% women) were enrolled. Of these, 2,286 suffered from CHF. Patients were conferred to torasemide (median dose 10.0 mg/d) with a 6-weeks follow-up. In CHF-patients, NYHA-grade was documented by the treating physician before torasemide treatment and at follow-up.

Results: After 6 weeks of treatment with torasemide, more than half of the patients improved according to their NYHA-grade. This amelioration was more pronounced the elder the patient was:

(Table 1 [Tab. 1])

Conclusion: In this study, the therapy with torasemide resulted in a pronounced improvement in NYHA-grade. The improvement correlates positively with the age of patients. Interestingly, the use of torasemide, in contrast to thiazides, is not limited by the glomerular filtration rate, which diminishes at increasing age. Further, at low doses as used in this study, torasemide is not likely to cause hypokalemia, a risk factor for cardiac mortality, whereas thiazides are associated with potassium losses. Torasemide might thus be superior to thiazides in terms of treating elderly patients suffering from congestive heart failure.