Prevalence of hypotension and its association with cognitive function among older adults

ABSTRACT

Background and Objective: The negative effect of hypertension has overshadowed possible health problems associated with hypotension. The purposes of this study were to describe the prevalence of hypotension in older adults and to determine the association between hypotension and cognitive function, after adjusting for possible covariates.

Methodology: The data for the study consisting of 1067 community-dwelling older adults were obtained from a national survey entitled “Identifying Psychosocial and Identifying Economic Risk Factor of Cognitive Impairment among Elderly”, conducted in Malaysia. The hypotension was considered as blood pressure <120/75 mm Hg, measuring by standard mercury manometer. Data analysis was performed using the SPSS Version 22.0.

Results: The mean age of the respondents was 68.27 (SD = 5.93). Mean score of cognitive function as measured by MMSE was 22.70 (SD = 4.95). The prevalence of hypotension was 29.3%. The prevalence of cognitive impairment for hypotension group was 25.6%. Results of multiple linear regression analysis revealed that hypotension is negatively associated with cognitive function (Beta = −0.11, p<.01), after adjusting for age, gender, education, marital status, employment status, diabetes, heart disease, stroke and gastritis.

Conclusion: The study showing hypotension is significantly associated with decreased cognitive function in later life, implies more attention to low blood pressure in old age.

KEYWORDS:

• Aged
• cognition
• hypotension

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to acknowledge the financial support under the Long Term Research Grant Scheme (LRGS) provided by Ministry of Education Malaysia (LRGS/BU/2012/UKM–UKM/K/01).We would like to express our gratitude to all co-researchers, fieldworkers, staff, local authorities and subjects for their willingness to cooperate with us to make our study a success.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

The study was conducted in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration, World Medical Association (WMA) and approved by the Medical Research Ethics Committee of Faculty of Medicine and Health Science.

Informed consent

Oral informed consent was obtained from all respondents who agreed to participate in the study after explaining objectives of the study. Oral informed consent is appropriate when potential risks associated with study are low for participants (Marshall, 2006).

Additional information

Funding

Ministry of Education Malaysia under the Long Term Research Grant Scheme (LRGS) [grant number LRGS/BU/2012/UKM-UKM/K/01].