Association of essential hypertension in elderly Japanese with I/D polymorphism of the angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) gene

Recent evidence suggests that an insertion/deletion (IID) polymorphism of t he gene encoding angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) is associated with myo cardial infarction and related cardiovascular diseases. We investigated a p ossible association of the A CE polymorphism with essential hypertension in a total of 263 cases/controls from among the elderly (age, over 70 years) and middle-aged (age between 30 and 60 years) Japanese population. The freq uency of the III homozygote was significantly higher in hypertensive subjec ts than in controls in the elderly age group (33/57 vs 16/46; P = 0.02), bu t no association was observed in the middle-aged group (25/75 vs 26/85; P = 0.71). Similarly, having at least one insertion allele was associated with essential hypertension in the elderly age group (83/114 vs 46/92 in contro ls; P = 0.001), but not in the middle-aged group (78/150 vs 94/170; P = 0.5 24). These data suggest that genetic variation at the ACE locus may be asso ciated with some determinants for blood pressure in elderly persons, and im ply the involvement of the ACE insertion/deletion polymorphism in the etiol ogy of age-related essential hypertension in the Japanese population.