High blood pressure, also called hypertension, affects billions of people worldwide and is one of the biggest causes of heart attacks, strokes, heart failure, and kidney disease.
Many people need daily medicine to control it, but blood pressure often remains too high because medications do not work well enough or are difficult to take every day.
A new international study suggests that a single injection given every six months could become a new way to help people keep their blood pressure under control.
The research was led by scientists at Queen Mary University of London and the findings were published in the journal JAMA.
The clinical trial, called KARDIA-2, included 663 adults whose blood pressure remained too high even though they were already taking blood pressure medicines.
Some participants continued their usual treatment, while others also received a new injectable medicine called zilebesiran.
The researchers found that people who received zilebesiran had a greater drop in blood pressure than those taking standard medicines alone.
One of the biggest advantages of the new treatment is that each injection continued working for about six months, meaning patients would only need two injections each year.
Unlike most blood pressure medicines, zilebesiran works by using a technology called RNA interference. It blocks the liver from making angiotensinogen, a protein that plays an important role in narrowing blood vessels. With less of this protein, blood vessels stay more relaxed and blood pressure falls.
Dr. Manish Saxena, the United Kingdom lead investigator for the study, said high blood pressure is a major health problem because many people do not achieve good control despite taking medication every day. He believes a treatment that only needs to be given twice a year could make it much easier for patients to stay on therapy.
The study also found that zilebesiran was generally safe when used together with standard blood pressure medicines. However, the researchers say larger and longer studies are still needed to better understand its long-term safety and whether rare side effects may appear.
Several more clinical trials are already planned. One study, called KARDIA-3, will test the medicine in people with heart disease or those at high risk of developing it. Another large trial will investigate whether lowering blood pressure with zilebesiran can also reduce heart attacks, strokes, and deaths from heart disease.
If these future studies are successful, zilebesiran could change the way high blood pressure is treated.
A medicine that only needs to be given twice a year could improve treatment adherence and help more people keep their blood pressure under control, reducing the risk of serious health problems.
If you care about high blood pressure, please read studies that early time-restricted eating could help improve blood pressure, and natural coconut sugar could help reduce blood pressure and artery stiffness.
For more health information, please see recent studies about How to eat your way to healthy blood pressure and results showing that Modified traditional Chinese cuisine can lower blood pressure.
