Hypertension is a major public health problem worldwide. However, limited information is available regarding the risk factors for hypertension in postmenopausal women, particularly in urban populations in developing countries such as India. To investigate whether adiposity measures, serum lipids and lipoproteins as well as fasting plasma glucose can predict the risk of hypertension in a population based sample of postmenopausal women in Kolkata, India, we conducted a cross-sectional study of 415 postmenopausal women (aged 40 to 85), selected by cluster sampling from 12 wards of Kolkata. After multivariate adjustment, apolipoprotein B (apo B) and waist circumference (WC) showed the strongest association with hypertension. The risk of hypertension in the highest tertile compared with the lowest tertile was 2.57 (95% confidence interval = 1.00-6.61) for apo B and 2.55 (95% confidence interval = 1.07-6.06) for WC. Apo B and WC were the strongest risk factors for predicting hypertension among postmenopausal women in Kolkata.
Keywords: West Bengal; apolipoprotein B; hypertension; population-based study; postmenopausal women; waist circumference.