MICROALBUMINURIA AS AN EARLY MARKER FOR LEFT VENTRICULAR HYPERTROPHY IN ESSENTIAL HYPERTENSIVE PATIENTS

Abstract

BACKGROUND
Hypertension increases the risk for a variety of cardiovascular diseases. Patients with
microalbuminuria are at increased risk not only for preclinical nephropathy but also for
cardiovascular morbidity. Left ventricular hypertrophy is a potent independent predictor of
cardiovascular events in hypertensive patients. Hence this cross sectional study was
conducted to examine whether microalbuminuria is associated with LVH in non-diabetic
hypertensive patients.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
The study was done primarily among inpatients of Yenepoya Medical College
Hospital, Deralakatte, Mangalore, Karnataka state located in South India. The study included
cases with essential hypertension who met predefined criteria. One hundred thirty-five cases
with essential hypertension were enrolled in the study after informed consent and excluding
patients with diabetes mellitus, macroalbuminuria, secondary hypertension, CKD, urinary
tract infections and acute febrile illness. Urine microalbumin spot was measured in all
essential hypertensive patients. eGFR was calculated by Cockroft and Gault formula.
2DECHO was done to look for left ventricular hypertrophy.
RESULTS AND OBSERVATIONS
In this study, it was found that out of 135 enrolled patients, 60 patients (44.4%) had
microalbuminuria and 75 patients (55.6%) had normoalbuminuria. 41 patients (30.4%) found
to have left ventricular hypertrophy, out of which 27 patients had microalbuminuria. Mean
urine microalbumin level among patients who had LVH was 65.3 which were clinically
significant. the correlation between increased microalbuminuria and presence of left
ventricular hypertrophy was found to be statistically significant.
CONCLUSION
Microalbuminuria is associated with LVH in essential hypertensive patients and thus
may serve as an early marker of LVH and help in identifying patients at increased
cardiovascular risk.
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