Cognitive assessment in the elderly with new mild systolic hypertension

Summary al of this investigation was to assess the early effects of new systolic hypertension on the cognitive function in the elderly. Using clinical measurements of blood pressure (WHO guidelines), 13 elderly normotensive and 13 elderly subjects with new systolic hypertension were selected, because it is more closely associated with cerebral damage. All 26 subjects were submitted to 24 hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring (ABPM) to confirm the pressure levels revealed using clinical measurements and to exclude the white-coat effect. The cognitive state was evaluated using the mini mental state examination (MMSE), and the acoustic evoked potential were also recorded with the objective of identifying a possible alteration of the cerebral function correlated to hypertensive pathology, not yet evident otherwise. ABPM data reaffirm the high values of systolic pressure in the elderly hypertensives and the cognitive function does not appear altered. In fact, we did not find any statistically significant differences between normotensive elders, neither in MMSE, a broad measure of cognitive functions, nor in the time lag of P300, being an expression of voluntary process of recognition and memorization of target stimuli.