OBJECTIVETo assess the relationship between parental history of hypertension and the incidence of cardiovascular disease in Chinese populations.

METHODSA total of 15 131 individuals (7015 men and 8116 women, aged from 35 to 59 years) in China were enrolled and followed up from 1992 to 2005. The information on the parental history of hypertension of the participants was collected. The individuals were divided into three groups according to their parental history of hypertension: those without parental history of hypertension (group 1), those with one parent history of hypertension (group 2) and those with both parents history of hypertension (group 3). The hazard ratio and its 95% confidence interval were calculated using the Cox proportional hazard model.

RESULTSThere were 448 cardiovascular events (including 82 cardiac events and 370 stroke events and 4 with both cardiac and stroke events) during the 163 858 person-years of observation. After adjusting for age, smoking and drinking, the hazard ratio for cardiovascular disease for group 1, group 2 and group 3 were 1.00, 1.34 (1.01 - 1.78), 2.58 (1.62 - 4.11) in men respectively and 1.00, 1.77 (1.27 - 2.45), 2.55 (1.44 - 4.54) in women respectively. After further adjusting for serum total cholesterol (TC), high density lipid cholesterol (HDL-C), fasting glucose, body mass index (BMI) and systolic blood pressure (SBP) in the model, the hazard ratio for cardiovascular disease for those three groups were 1.00, 1.01 (0.76 - 1.35), 1.72 (1.07 - 2.75) in men respectively and 1.00, 1.31 (0.94 - 1.84), 1.76 (0.98 - 3.15) in women respectively.

CONCLUSIONThe individuals with parental history of hypertension have a higher risk of cardiovascular disease, especially for those with both parents history of hypertension.