Short-term double-blind comparison of doxazosin and atenolol in patients with mild to moderate hypertension.

The antihypertensive effect and safety of doxazosin once-daily was compared with that of atenolol once-daily in 40 patients with mild to moderate hypertension. During the first 4 weeks all patients received placebo therapy. During the subsequent 10 weeks patients were randomized to doxazosin or atenolol treatment. Treatment was initiated with 1 mg doxazosin or 50 mg atenolol once-daily. The dose could be doubled biweekly until a final dose of 16 mg doxazosin or 100 mg atenolol was reached. The average final dose of doxazosin was 6.4 +/- 0.8 mg (SEM) and that of atenolol 66.7 +/- 5.7 mg. During the 10 weeks of active treatment, the systolic and diastolic blood pressure tended to be lower (p less than 0.05) in patients on atenolol, this difference was however not significant for the standing blood pressure. Recumbent and standing heart rate were lower (p less than 0.01) during atenolol. Multiple regression analysis showed that in the doxazosin group the recumbent systolic blood pressure after 10 weeks of treatment was significantly (p less than 0.05) and independently related to age, recumbent systolic blood pressure at randomization, and the changes in recumbent heart rate. In neither group severe adverse reactions were observed. However, two patients on doxazosin dropped out of the study: one because of blurred vision and persistent high blood pressure, and one because of fatigue and palpitations. No patient dropped out of the atenolol group during the study.