Severe hypertension in the Spanish population. Association with specific HLA antigens.

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Abstract
There is now increasing evidence for immunological changes in essential hypertension. Immunological response is determined in part by genes linked to the HLA system. It has been reported a positive association between HLA B15 and the risk for cerebral events in essential hypertensive (EH) patients. We studied the distribution of HLA antigens in 128 EH (age range, 13-85 years) and 1000 normotensive controls. EH were classified in accordance with the World Health Organization (WHO) criteria: in WHO Stages I and II, there were 100 patients; in WHO Stage III, there were 28 patients. HLA-A and B antigens of peripheral blood lymphocytes were studied according to the microlymphocytotoxicity test. The results were compared by chi-square analysis, and the p value was multiplied by the number of antigens studied at each locus, to avoid overestimation of an association. Frequency of HLA-BW 22 was higher in EH compared with controls (5.4% vs 1.2%, p less than 0.01). Frequency of HLA-B12 in EH with WHO Stage III hypertension (64.2%) was significantly increased compared either with EH in WHO Stage I or II (29%, p less than 0.01) or the control group (26.9% p less than 0.001). The incidence of HLA-B15 antigen in the whole hypertensive group was 3.1%, lower than in normotensive controls (6.4%, p less than 0.8). None of the patients with WHO Stage III hypertension had the HLA-B15 antigen. In conclusion, the results seemed to indicated that the Spanish population had an association between HLA-B12 and severe hypertension.