CORRELATION BETWEEN SERUM URIC ACID LEVELS AND HYPERTENSION

Background: Hypertension is the silent killer. Approximately 85% to 90% of hypertension cases have unknown cause (primary hypertension). Previous studies revealed that prooxidant effect of uric acid causes an increase in blood pressure. However, other studies revealed that uric acid was not an independent risk factor of hypertension. The difference in these results lead the author interested in conducting this research. Objective: the purpose of this study to determine correlation between serum uric acid levels and hypertension. Method: This study used a cross-sectional design. Samples were patients with hypertension at the cardiology clinic of NTB general hospital. The sample was selected by consecutive sampling to achieve the required total sample, which amounted to 51 people. Data was obtained from the results of questionnaires, blood pressure checking and laboratory examination. The statistical analysis used was Spearman correlation test. Result: There is no significant correlation between level of serum uric acid and systolic blood pressure (p = 0.422, r = 0.115) or diastolic blood pressure (p = 0.976,r = -0,004). This is probably because the most of samples have controlled hypertension so prooxidant effect of uric acid did not significantly increase blood pressure. Conclusion: The level of serum uric acid did not correlate significantly with the systolic and diastolic blood pressure in hypertensive patients.