The Relative Efficacy of Guanethidine, Methyldopa and Pargyline as Antihypertensive Agents

Abstract

A SIGNIFICANT advance in the treatment of moderate to malignant hypertension has been the development of potent agents that selectively impair adrenergic neuron transmission. The most frequently used drugs in this group currently are guanethidine, methyldopa and pargyline. Although they all act by interfering with adrenergic neuron function their pharmacologic mechanisms and clinical effects differ significantly. Despite these differences no previous study has compared the clinical effectiveness of these 3 agents, and those studies comparing 2 of them have been based on nonrandomized sequences and comparison under conditions that were not well defined.The purpose of this study was to . . .