Drugs & aging
Planned Antihypertensive Deprescribing in Long-Term Care Residents: A Systematic Review of Randomized Evidence
By Jiang G, Yang G, Liu Y and 1 others.
Abstract
Background
Evidence supporting antihypertensive treatment in older adults is derived largely from populations that differ from long-term care residents, in whom frailty, dementia, multimorbidity, polypharmacy, and competing clinical priorities may alter the balance between preventive benefit and treatment burden.
Objectives
The aim was to synthesize randomized evidence on planned antihypertensive deprescribing in institutional long-term care and determine whether clinically and methodologically comparable effects support a common treatment-effect estimate.
Methods
Randomized or cluster-randomized studies of planned antihypertensive deprescribing in long-term care were systematically reviewed. MEDLINE/PubMed, Embase, CENTRAL, CINAHL Complete, Web of Science Core Collection, trial registries, and PROSPERO were searched from inception and updated to 20 August 2026. Meta-analysis was reserved for outcomes with at least two clinically and methodologically compatible estimates of a common, interpretable effect; otherwise, structured study-level synthesis was used. Result-specific risk of bias was assessed with the revised Cochrane risk-of-bias tool (RoB 2), and certainty with the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) tool.