Echocardiographic comparison of black and white hypertensive subjects.

Echocardiography was used to compare cardiac structure and function in 35 pairs of hypertensive blacks and hypertensive whites matched for age, sex, level and known duration of hypertension, treatment status, and renin level.Echocardiographic abnormalities were common in both groups and included increased ventricular septal thickness and/or left ventricular free-wall thickness in 51 percent of black hypertensives and 69 percent of white hypertensives. Paired analysis indicated no significant difference between black and white hypertensive subjects in any of the echocardiographic parameters including ventricular transverse dimensions (at end diastole and at end systole), left atrial and aortic root dimensions, left ventricular ejection fraction, and mitral valve E-F slope. Thus echocardiographic evaluation of black and white hypertensive subjects, matched for clinical characteristics, suggests a similar prevalence of cardiac abnormalities in the two groups.