Visual evoked potential and Brainstem auditory evoked potential changes in primary hypertension

Introduction: Systemic hypertension or Essential hypertension is a major public health problem, though usually asymptomatic, hyperten-sion may leads to a number of complications involving almost all organ systems but its effects on brain contribute to the major part of morbidity and mortality.VEP and BERA have also been used to study changes in hypertensive patients. Method: In the present study, 30 patients of primary hypertension were examined to enroll in the study along with a group of 30 no-rmotensive individuals as controls. The study was aimed at assessing the VEP and BAEP of these subjects and to compare the results between the hypertensive and normotensives and to find correlation, if any, between the blood pressure and var-ious parameters of VEP and BAEP. Observation and Result: Mean values of VEP in the two groups of subjects compared, showed statistically non-significant increase of absolute lat-encies of VEP waves. Prolongation of the absolute latencies of BAEP waves I and IV in hypertensive group compared to normotensive group sho-wed statistically significant difference. The latencies of other absolute waves were also found to be prolonged but the statisti-cal significance could not be established. Conclusion : These changes in our group of subjects supports our hypothesis and needs further confirmation in patients with longer dura-tion of disease as well as study of effect of various factors such as age, target organ involvement and antihypertensive drugs.