Giving a hypertension drug to people with heart disease saves lives even if they have normal blood pressure, and a calcium channel blocker drug is more effective than an ACE inhibitor, a new study finds.The researchers tested the calcium channel blocker amlodipine against the ACE inhibitor enalapril and a placebo in 1,991 patients with coronary artery disease whose blood pressure was normal by current standards. Over two years, the rate of adverse events such as a heart attack or death was 31 percent lower for those getting amlodipine and 15.3 percent lower for those getting enalapril, compared to patients getting the placebo, said a report in the Nov. 10 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.
