[Abnormal glycemic metabolism in essential hypertension. Role of the an oral glucose tolerance test].
OBJECTIVE
There is a high prevalence of diabetes in essential hypertensive patients, hence increasing the cardiovascular risk of these subjects. Our aim was to test the importance of a routine assessment of an oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) in a sample of recently diagnosed essential hypertensives.


METHODS
We studied 270 recently diagnosed untreated hypertensives (56% males). We measured fasting lipids and plasma glucose and insulin at baseline and after OGTT.


RESULTS
38.5% of the studied subjects had any abnormality of glucose metabolism, glucose intolerance (22.2%) and type 2 diabetes (12.2%) being the most common. An impaired fasting glucose was present in 4.1% of subjects. Patients with intolerance or type 2 diabetes had a worse plasma lipid profile, and those with impaired fasting glucose, a higher HOMA index.


CONCLUSIONS
The high incidence of glucidic abnormalities found in hypertensive patients signals a need to perform an OGTT test in them. This can lead to the implementation of strategies aimed at halting vascular impairment in hypertensives with type 2 diabetes and delay the development of type 2 diabetes in patients with glucose intolerance.
Stiefel
Pablo
P
Unidad Clínico Experimental de Riesgo Vascular, Servicio de Medicina Interna, Hospital Universitario Virgen del Rocío, Spain.
Miranda
María Luisa
ML
Muñiz
Ovidio
O
Nieto
María Dolores
MD
Jiménez
Luis
L
Villar
José
J
D000328:Adult; D001786:Blood Glucose / Q000378:metabolism*; D003924:Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2 / Q000150:complications / Q000517:prevention & control; D005260:Female; D018149:Glucose Intolerance / Q000150:complications* / Q000175:diagnosis; D005951:Glucose Tolerance Test; D006801:Humans; D006973:Hypertension / Q000097:blood* / Q000150:complications*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged
D001786:Blood Glucose