[Management of hypertension and diabetes in Primary Care clinical practice: ATENCION study]

Abstract

Background and objective: Cardiovascular diseases are the main cause of death in the Spanish population. The detection and control of cardiovascular risk factors are fundamental in the prevention of cardiovascular disease. The main objectives of this study are to analyse the attitudes and therapeutic decisions of Primary Care (PC) physicians when treating hypertension (HT) and diabetes mellitus type 2 (DM2), with the aim of establishing the situation and eventually proposing improvement strategies.

Material and method: A national ecological, multicentre, cross-sectional, and descriptive study was conducted in 2013. A questionnaire was used and 1,028 PC physicians took part in the study.

Results: A total of 92.9% of the investigators consulted have indicated that they follow the guidelines for evaluation, treatment, and diagnosis of HT, and 91.4% in the case of diabetes. The latter is diagnosed as a casual finding, while HT is diagnosed through active investigation in patients with other risk factors. Combined therapy takes more than 6 months to take effect in patients with HT, and between 8 and 9 months in diabetic patients. The percentage of non-compliance is similar (10-40%) in both pathologies. Around half the physicians questioned considered interaction with the specialist to be good or excellent (46% HT and 57.3% DM2).

Conclusions: Clinical practices in PC for HT and DM2 have some basic criteria in common. The interaction with the specialist is good, but there is a considerable margin for improvement.

Keywords: Diabetes mellitus; Hipertensión; Hypertension; Professional practice; Práctica profesional.