Preface [Hot Topic: Treatment of Hypertension, Its Pathophysiology and the Clinical Use of Antihypertensive Drugs (Executive Editor: Gregory Y.H. Lip)]

This issue of Current Pharmaceutical Design, for which I have the honour to be Executive Guest Editor, addresses topical issues relating to the treatment of hypertension, its pathophysiology and the clinical use of antihypertensive drugs. Davis et al. [1] discusses antihypertensive drug development and the importance of ethnicity. They apply valuable lessons learnt from heart failure management and discuss the implications for hypertension treatment. Grassi [2] then addresses sympathetic and baroreflex function in hypertension. The implications for current and new drugs for hypertension are succinctly reviewed. Nadar et al. [3,4] then addresses the commonly seen problem of endothelial dysfunction in hypertension. In their first article [3], methods of assessment of the endothelium and application to hypertension are reviewed in detail, which would be of use in designing studies to determine the effects of antihypertensive agents on the endothelium. In the second article [4], the effects of current antihypertensive therapy on endothelial function are comprehensively reviewed. Increasing evidence points towards the importance of hypertension in peripheral artery disease, and Clement et al. [5] elegantly review this area with respect to hypertension. Finally, Wofford and Hall [6] provide a comprehensive review of obesity hypertension, which is a topic increasingly relevant to pharmaceutical design, with antiobesity drugs and the epidemic of obesity contributing to cardiovascular disease. Given the excellence of reviews contained in this issue, I hope that the readers of Current Pharmaceutical Design will find this issue useful for updating their knowledge of the many developments of the exciting field of antihypertensive drugs.