A new, low-cost, solar-powered blood-pressure-monitoring device has been shown to be accurate and easy to use and was well accepted by healthcare professionals and patients in a field trial in Africa. This could be a "critical tool" in tackling the global problem of hypertension, said one expert.

Doctors from the Portuguese Society of Hypertension have spearheaded a unique mass-media campaign about the harmful consequences of consuming too much salt, which in turn has led to the Portuguese Parliament approving a law restricting the sodium content of processed foods.

A phase 3 study with darusentan in patients with resistant hypertension was encouraging, but the data are still "very, very early," said the researcher who presented the late-breaking trial at the European Hypertension meeting this weekend.

The lead investigator for a controversial new analysis of hydrochlorothiazide says the drug is a "paltry" antihypertensive at the usual doses prescribed (12.5 mg-25 mg/per day) and should not be used as initial therapy. Others, however, offered plenty of caveats for the "provocative" conclusions.

The European Society of Hypertension is set to stir up the field of BP guidelines later this year, when it publishes an update to its 2007 recommendations. One key change is the recognition of a level of blood pressure below which could be dangerous to high-risk individuals, the so-called J-curve phenomenon. And the new guidelines will advise tailoring therapy to individual patients, rather than recommending a first-, second- and third-line drug therapy approach.