The efficacy and safety of blood pressure (BP) lowering initiated at baseline systolic BP (SBP) of 130-140 mm Hg in patients with diabetes remain controversial. The authors aimed to investigate the benefits and harms of BP lowering initiated at these levels for patients with diabetes. Medline and EMBASE were searched from inception to March 10, 2018. The primary outcome was major cardiovascular events. Random-effects model was used to pool all the estimates. Six trials with 21 574 diabetics were included. In diabetics, initiating BP lowering at baseline SBP of 130 and 140 mm Hg did not reduce the rate of major cardiovascular events (RR, 1.01 [95% CI, 0.93-1.10]), finding that was consistent in subgroup and sensitivity analyses. Moreover, BP lowering did not reduce the risks of myocardial infarction (RR, 0.99 [95% CI, 0.85-1.16]), stroke (0.83 [95% CI, 0.54-1.27]), heart failure (0.91 [95% CI, 0.79-1.04]), albuminuria (0.93 [95% CI, 0.84-1.04]), end-stage renal disease (0.93 [95% CI, 0.70-1.24]), cardiovascular death (1.25 [95% CI, 0.90-1.74]) and all-cause death (1.05 [95% CI, 0.94-1.17]) in patients with diabetes and baseline SBP of 130-140 mm Hg but possibly increase the risks of serious adverse events (RR, 2.00 [95% CI, 1.33-3.01]) and hypotension (5.30 [95% CI, 0.99-28.40]). In diabetics, initiating BP lowering at baseline SBP of 130-140 mm Hg may not produce any benefit but probably increase the risks of serious adverse events and hypotension. It may not be recommended to initiate BP lowering at a threshold of SBP lower than 140 mm Hg for diabetics.
Keywords: blood pressure lowering; cardiovascular outcome; diabetes; hypertension.
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