Is It Possible To Treat High Blood Pressure With A Vaccine?

For many individuals who are suffering from high blood pressure the only long-term answer is daily pills and repeated monitoring by your physician with alterations to your dosage or changes in your pills as required. So just how much better would it be if you were able to simply be vaccinated against high blood pressure and do away with the nuisance of your daily pills?

Almost 1 in 3 Americans are suffering from high blood pressure but, because of the complex mix of tablets frequently required for treatment, only some one third of those individuals in fact have their blood pressure problem under control. However, this might be set to change shortly.

In a trial carried out earlier this year a group of 72 people (7 women and 65 men with an average age of just over 51) who were suffering from mild or moderate high blood pressure were injected with a low dose (100 micrograms) vaccine, a high dose (300 micrograms) vaccine or a placebo. This injection was then repeated after four weeks and at the end of twelve weeks.

Fourteen days after the final injection it was found that the high dose vaccine patients showed a drop of more than 5 mm Hg in their systolic blood pressure and almost 3 mm Hg in their diastolic blood pressure reading.

More notable, it was also found that the usual, and often dangerous, peek in blood pressure that occurs in the morning between 5 am and 8 am was also down significantly by 25 mm Hg systolic and 13 mm Hg diastolic.

The individuals in the trial all tolerated the vaccine without difficulty and there were no safety issues during the trial.

So just how does the vaccine work?

At present blood pressure is treated with a number of drugs that are designed to act in different ways. Two of the classes of drugs often used are angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors (such as Lotensin, Prinivil, Accupril, Monopril, Mavik, Capoten, Altace and Zestril) and angiotensin-2 (AT-2) receptor blockers (such as Atacand, Micardis, Avapro, Cozaar and Teveten). All of these drugs work by blocking the action of a hormone that causes the blood vessels to tighten and therefore to increase the pressure within the blood vessels.

The trial vaccine, which is known as CYT006-ANgQb, is designed to work in the same way as these two currently used drugs and so may certainly be an alternative for those individuals whose high blood pressure is currently treated using AT-2 receptor blockers or ACE inhibitors.

So what about those individuals whose blood pressure is currently being treated with the alternatives of beta blockers (such as Sectral, Lopressor, Cartol, Ziac, Betapace, Blocadren, Inderal, Kerlone, Tenormin and Zebeta) or calcium channel blockers (such as Norvasc, Vascor, Nimotop, Lotrel, Procardia, Cardizem, Adalat, Isoptin, Calan, Plendil and Verelan)?

Well, it is early days yet and further trials will be required before we see a vaccine in general use for the treatment of high blood pressure. If the scientists are correct however it seems likely that this vaccine will be effective for most sufferers, whatever the treatment presently being given.

Time will tell of course, however this is obviously a very encouraging development.

Keywords: