Quality-of-care of Filipino patients with hypertension in primary care settings

BACKGROUND: Hypertension is one of the most common conditions seen in the Philippine primary care setting. Adequate quality of care provided in accordance with clinical practice guidelines (CPG) for the control and management of hypertension is necessary to improve patient outcomes. This study aimed to determine the quality of care received by Filipino patients with hypertension in selected urban, rural and remote primary care facilities. METHODOLOGY: This is a retrospective cohort study involving electronic medical records (EMR) data in three different study sites of the Philippine Primary Care Studies (PPCS) program. All outpatient visits of adult patients with a diagnosis of hypertension who consulted from the years 2019 to 2022 were included. Strong recommendations from the JNC8 guidelines were utilized to determine quality-of-care indicators, namely self-monitoring of blood pressure, type of pharmacologic management, advice on non-pharmacologic management, and advice to follow-up. RESULTS: The study included a total of 2,452 patients with 7,277 hypertension-related consults across urban, rural, and remote study sites between the years 2019-2022. Across all patients with follow-up consults, 500 (20.5%) attained BP lowering threshold of < 140/