Prevalence and Risk Factors of Microalbuminuria in Hypertensive Patients of Tertiary Care Hospital

Background: Microalbuminuria in hypertension has been described as an early sign of kidney damage and a predictor for end stage renal disease and cardiovascular disease. More specifically it is seen amongst patients suffering from hypertension. Methods: This study was conducted at Dr. Ram Manohar Lohia Institute of Medical Sciences, Lucknow, India in the department of emergency medicine and 84 subjects were included in the evaluation in the age of more than 30 years. All patients were diagnosed by clinical examination, anthropometric measurement, blood pressure, urinary microalbumin, and urinary creatinine. Statistical analysis was done by using SPSS, version 16.0 p-values were calculated by chi-square test, ANOVA unpaired t-test. The p <0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: It was found that microalbuminuria among hypertensive patients increased steadily with the advancing age and the duration of hypertension. The features of high urinary microalbumin 52.09±8.62 mg/24hr and the urinary creatinine 2.37±0.86mg/dl were prevalent in hypertensive patients and it increased in both male and female patients. Conclusions: The prevalence of microalbuminuria in hypertensive individuals is high, and it revealed strong association between microalbuminuria and hypertension. Our findings suggest that microalbuminuria could be a useful marker to assess risk stratification and management of cardiovascular disease and renal disease.