[Cerebrovascular reactivity in elderly patients with essential hypertension]

Twenty-six patients (mean age 66.3 +/- 6.5 years) with long-term arterial hypertension were studied. In resting state the indices of cerebral hemodynamics did not differ substantially in the patients comparing to those in controls with normal arterial pressure. However, during functional tests with breath-holding and hyperventilation elderly patients with long-term mild and moderate essential arterial hypertension showed, disturbance of cerebrovascular reactivity manifesting in reduction of reactivity coefficients in response to hypo- and hypercapnic loading, earlier restoration of baseline blood flow speed in medial brain artery after hyperventilation and to breath-holding test (20%).