ESH 2008: Pritor/Kinzal at the Hypertension 2008 in Berlin, Germany

(Jul 2008) Berlin was the venue of this year’s International Society of Hypertension/European Society of Hypertension (ISH/ESH) joint congress, “Hypertension 2008”, providing an exciting opportunity to welcome physicians to the home of Bayer Schering Pharma (BSP) under the theme of ‘Your destination – our home’.

Over the course of the congress, Pritor/Kinzal conducted two satellite symposia, a joint press conference with Adalat, and an interactive product exhibition booth, demonstrating our continued commitment to hypertension management.

The telmisartan symposium entitled “Reducing Cardiovascular Risk: New Insights from ONTARGET” had the key ONTARGET investigators – Professors Sleight (UK), Mancia (Italy), Weber (USA), Bakris (USA) and Yusuf (Canada) – discuss the need to go beyond blood pressure goals to manage total cardiovascular risk. Moreover, they presented evidence of the renal and cardioprotective benefits associated with telmisartan’s (Pritor/Kinzal) unique pharmacology.

The second symposium, entitled “ONTARGET: New Standard in Cardio & Vascular Protection”, focused on the results of the ONTARGET trial. Highlighting that telmisartan (Pritor/Kinzal) was demonstrated to be as effective as ramipril in reducing the risk of cardiovascular death, myocardial infarction, stroke and hospitalization for heart failure, with greater tolerability and treatment compliance shown, even in patients selected as ACE tolerant, the panel, facilitated by Professor Mancia (Italy) discussed the implications of the results in clinical practice.

In addition, selected local KOLs from different countries were invited to “Meet Bayer Schering Pharma at home”, a unique behind-the-scenes visit with BSP Executives at the Berlin headquarters. Dr. Stefan Schröder, Head of Global Strategic Marketing Cardiovascular Risk Management, opened the event with a warm welcome before Dr. Gunnar Riemann, Member of the Board of Management of Bayer Schering Pharma AG, shared interesting facts about the company. With an overview of BSP’s cardiovascular risk management and cardiology portfolio, Dr. Jean-Philippe Milon, Head of the newly created General Medicine Business Unit, provided insights into the successfully marketed brands Adalat, Aspirin Cardio, Pritor/Kinzal and Glucobay as well as the new blockbuster Xarelto or the development candidate the oral stimulator of soluble Guanylate Cyclase (sGC) and how they complement each other. Professor Unger (Charité – Universitätsmedizin, Berlin) then highlighted Pritor/Kinzal and its proven effects beyond blood pressure control, followed by Professor Mancia (University Milan-Bicocca) who focused on the success story of Adalat.

The joint Adalat-Pritor/Kinzal press conference titled “Advancing Cardiovascular Protection” featured leading experts from the field of cardiovascular disease who presented the latest news about research for optimal treatment of hypertension and offered unique insights into cardiovascular disease management to European journalists. Professor Hermann Haller moderated the event and facilitated question and answer sessions with his co-panel members and the attending journalists throughout the press conference.

Taking into consideration the latest international guidelines concerning the goals of hypertensive therapy, Dr. Peter Meredith evaluated how hypertension affects the progression of cardiovascular disease, and detailed different approaches how greater protection can be achieved. While calcium channel blockers (CCB) and angiotensin II receptor blockers (ARB) offer different pathways and mechanisms to treat hypertension, the CCB nifedipine GITS (Adalat), and the ARB telmisartan (Pritor/Kinzal) each have been proven to offer exemplary blood pressure control in the ACTION and INSIGHT trials, as well as in the PROTECTION study program, respectively.