Hypertension is a significant risk factor for cardiovascular disease and is associated with stroke and heart attack respectively. St James’s Hospital offers a specialist hypertension clinic which accepts referrals from primary and secondary care. In this project, the two groups of interest include: patients with resistant hypertension and young adults with hypertension. Resistant hypertension sufferers are defined as those who require four or more medications to control their blood pressure or who are on three anti-hypertensives but with uncontrolled blood pressure. Young adults are those with a hypertension diagnosis under the age of forty. This study will look into the reasons for referral into this clinic, identify the treatment of resistant hypertensives before and after therapy. It will also categorise the patients in the context of their cardiovascular risk factors, associated co-morbidities, reason for referral and respective blood pressure readings.
