Does masked hypertension exist in healthy volunteers and apparently well-controlled hypertensive patients?
BACKGROUND
Home blood pressure (HB P) measurement is considered to reflect BP during the day better than office BP (OB P). But in some patients HB P is higher than OB P. This is called masked hypertension (MH).


OBJECTIVE
To examine whether MH occurs in healthy volunteers and apparently well-controlled hypertensives.


METHODS
57 treated hypertensive patients and 31 healthy volunteers (27/22 men) participated. Mean age (+/- SD ) was 61 +/- 13 and 29 +/- 13 years, respectively. Patients were instructed to measure their BP twice daily for three days (3 readings each) with the Omron 705 CP device after at least 10 minutes rest in a comfortable sitting position. In the outpatient department, OB P was measured four times, in duplicate, every ten minutes by the physician using the same device and under similar conditions.


RESULTS
Mean HB P of the treated hypertensive group was 146/84 +/- 18/10 mmHg, significantly higher than OB P 136/79 +/- 19/10 (p.
Aksoy
I
I
Department of Medicine, Division of General Internal Medicine, Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre, the Netherlands.
Deinum
J
J
Lenders
J W M
JW
Thien
Th
T
D000328:Adult; D001795:Blood Pressure Determination / Q000592:standards*; D003951:Diagnostic Errors; D005260:Female; D064368:Healthy Volunteers; D006801:Humans; D006973:Hypertension / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000188:drug therapy; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009426:Netherlands; D009819:Office Visits; D010361:Patients / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D010865:Pilot Projects; D012648:Self Care