• Martin I Lapidus, André Falcón, Carolina Antonietti, and Verónica Peuchot.
• Servicio de Clínica Médica, Hospital Italiano de Buenos Aires, Argentina. E-mail: martin.lapidus@hospitalitaliano.org.ar.
• Medicina (B Aires). 2021 Jan 1; 81 (6): 1002-1006.

AbstractHypertension (HTN) is a prevalent disease. A 30% of the population is unaware of having HTN and 65% of patients with HTN have a poor control. There is no standardized way to diagnose HTN in the inpatient setting. This is why the focus on this population, both for the diagnosis of HT and for the detection of poor control, is relevant. It was a cross sectional study of hospitalized adult patients (>18 years old) for clinical causes, in 2017. Hypertensive emergencies were excluded. Elevated blood pressure (EBP) was defined as the registry of SBP = 140 and / or DBP = 90 mmHg on two or more occasions, on two different days, measured through a sphygmomanometer, and/or one-time indication of antihypertensive medication. A total of 2203 patients were included. Median age: 73 years (IIQ 25-75%: 56-86). Women: 55% (1203). Median days of hospitalization: 5 (IIQ 25-75% 4-9). A 58% of them were known hypertensive. The prevalence of EBP was 7.6% [168, 95% CI 6.6-8.8], of which 12.5% (21) were unaware of having HTN. Compared to patients without EBP, the mean SBP and DBP were higher, they were older (77 vs. 73 years, p < 0.001), had higher rates of chronic kidney disease (21% vs. 12% p < 0.001), stroke (15% vs. 10% p = 0.035) and HTN (87% vs. 56% p < 0.001). They had more events of heart failure (8% vs. 3%, p <0.001) and stroke (3.6% vs. 1.2%, p = 0.02) during hospitalization. The prevalence of EBP was lower compared to previous studies. We observed an association between cardiovascular events and EBP.

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