Objective: To investigate the impact of sex differences and disease factors on drug monotherapy choice for hypertension. Design and Methods: The data for this study were collected from patient’s medical files. The sample studied included 876 patients with cardiovascular diseases. Focus was made on the 228 patients with uncomplicated and complicated hypertension who were receiving monotherapy. SPSS was used for data entering and statistical analysis. Results: 43% (98) of the treated men and 57% (130) of the treated women were on monotherapy for hypertension. Women tend to be treated with diuretics more often than men while men were more often treated with beta blockers. Prevalence of the four major anti-hypertesive drug classes among men and women were as follows: diuretics (men 12%, women 32%), [beta]-blocker (men 45%, women 42%), calcium antagonist (men 15%, women 11%) or an angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitor (men 27%, women 15%). Disease factors that produce significant impact on drug choice include age category, diabetes mellitus, and bronchodilators co-medication. Presence of ischemic heart disease does not have statistically significant impact on BB or CCB antihypertensive drug choice. Conclusions: The pattern of antihypertensive drug use is influenced by sex and presence of other co-morbid conditions. The influence of sex needs further long term investigation. In general, physicians in Palestine take most known indications and contra-indications into account when they prescribe an antihypertensive drug motherapy.

The Islamic University Journal (Series of Natural Studies and Engineering), Vol.14, No.1, P.51-61, 2006