Mild Hypertension Helps Seniors' Cognitive Skills

An Israeli study suggests that a little hypertension may protect the cognitive skills of individuals after age 70. The researchers evaluated 385 participants?36 did not have hypertension, 74 were normalized hypertensives, 103 were untreated hypertensives, and 172 were treated but uncontrolled hypertensives. The participants were given cognitive tests that calculated memory, concentration, visual retention, verbal fluency, and the Mini- Mental State Examination. "After adjusting for confounding variables, those with treated but uncontrolled hypertension performed significantly better than at least one of the other groups, and those who were normotensive performed the poorest, said the authors in the American Journal of Hypertension (October 2003).