Hypertension, as the most common and major risk factor in cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, has become a major public health issue facing China, bringing a heavy burden of health economics to the society. However, due to the early and comprehensive intervention with antihypertensive drugs, the pathogenesis of hypertension has undergone profound changes compared with that before. The dizziness in traditional medical texts cannot be completely equated with hypertension, and the understanding of this disease is not limited to traditional pathogeneses such as hyperactivity of liver Yang and internal movement of liver wind. Therefore, it is urgent to explore the modern pathogenesis and clinical treatment rules. In recent years, traditional Chinese medicine(TCM) treatment of hypertension has attracted much attention for its ability to steadily and gently lower blood pressure. On the basis of 20 years of clinical practice and the review of classics and progress of modern evidence-based medicine research, our research group proposes that the treatment of hypertension should follow the principle of "one core, two key mechanisms, three pathogeneses, and four prevention and treatment goals". Among them, "one core" refers to blood pressure reduction; "two mechanisms" refer to glucose and lipid metabolism and water and sodium metabolism; "three pathogeneses" refer to fire syndrome, fluid retention syndrome, and deficiency syndrome; "four prevention and treatment goals" refer to stable blood pressure reduction, reversal of risk factors, protection of target organs, and reduction of cardiovascular endpoint events. This treatment principle provides new ideas for the clinical prevention and treatment of hypertension with TCM.
Keywords: deficiency syndrome; fire syndrome; fluid retention syndrome; hypertension; traditional Chinese medicine.