Genetic basis of hypertension for the development of tailored medicine.

Similar to a tsunami wave, a new surge of genome-wide association studies in common complex diseases has succeeded in identifying the causative genetic risk factors of hypertension. The current status of genomic studies in hypertension, however, remains disorganized, and there are no clear solutions in sight. One possible reason for this disorganization is the small effect of each genetic variant on the predisposition to hypertension. Another reason could be that the morbidity of hypertension is typically used as a target to assess genetic contribution, which could be resolved by introducing new technology into the classical genetic analysis. In this review, we reaffirm the genetic basis of hypertension and outline recent progress in genomics. In addition, we discuss both the possibility and usefulness of genomic information in the development of tailored medicine.