Target organ damage in newly detected hypertensive patients

BACKGROUND: Hypertension (HTN) is difficult to diagnose since it is asymptomatic. Most of the patients with HTN are unaware of their disease, and hence a large number of these subjects have target organ damage (TOD) on their first arrival at hospital or clinic. Hence, early detection and treatment of TOD determines the cardiovascular prognosis in hypertensive patient and can retard or prevent further damage. METHODS: An observational and cross-sectional study was carried out in a tertiary care hospital and clinical profile was collected. Newly detected hypertensive men and women were recruited from outpatient and inpatient departments of medicine based on a set of inclusion and exclusion criteria. The study was carried out over a duration of 18 months from March 2014 to August 2015. RESULTS: A total of 150 participants were included in the study with a mean age of 51.64 ± 11.64 years. A total of 91 participants had presence of at least one TOD. In our study, retinopathy (20.67%), macroalbuminuria (MA) (44.67%), electrocardiographic left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) (20.67%), echocardiographic LVH (29.33%), diastolic dysfunction (21.33%), and systolic dysfunction (3.33%) were particularly notable. Grade 3 retinopathy, microalbuminria, and diastolic dysfunction were associated with severity of HTN. CONCLUSION: We conclude that a strong relationship exists between HTN and TOD. The evidence for TOD was found to be greater than that expected in newly detected hypertensive patients. Hence, a tight control of blood pressure represents the first step in treating essential HTN, which not only keep the blood pressure under control and further steps to be taken to prevent or retard the onset/progression of TOD.