White Coat Hypertension May Actually Be An Acute Phase Reactant In The Body

Background: We tried to understand the significance of white coat hypertension (WCH), clinically.Methods: We took consecutive underweight patients in the first phase, and age-matched consecutive patients with normal weight, overweight, and obesity in the second phase of the study.Results: Although we were able to detect 50 cases in the underweight group with a mean age of 24.7 years, we were only able to detect nine age-matched cases in the obesity group, thus the obesity group was not taken for comparison. There were gradual and statistically significant increases in the prevalence of WCH beside the gradual and significant decreases in the sustained normotension (NT) from the underweight towards the normal weight and overweight groups. Eventually, only 31.8% of the overweight cases had sustained NT although they had very young mean age.Conclusions: Due to the gradually increased prevalence of WCH from the underweight towards the normal weight and overweight groups and the very low prevalence of sustained NT in the overweight group despite their very young mean age and the already known increased prevalence of hypertension, impaired fasting glucose, impaired glucose tolerance, type 2 diabetes mellitus, hypertriglyceridemia, hyperbetalipoproteinemia, dyslipidemia, coronary artery disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, cirrhosis, chronic renal disease, and stroke and an increased all-cause mortality rate in the same direction, WCH may actually be an acute phase reactant, mainly alarming overweight and obesity and many associated health problems in future.