Impairment in preattentive processing among patients with hypertension revealed by visual mismatch negativity

Patients with hypertension show deficits in cognitive function. However, the neural mechanisms underlying the preattentive information processing in hypertensive patients are poorly understood. We seek to investigate whether hypertensive patients have impairments in preattentive information processing.

We compared visual mismatch negativity (vMMN) between 15 hypertensive patients and 15 age-matched healthy controls, which was elicited by the change of visual duration randomly presented in both peripheral visual fields. In addition, the global cognitive function for all participants was assessed with Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE).

The vMMN in deviant-standard comparison was observed at occipital-temporal regions. Compared with normal healthy controls, the amplitude of vMMN was significantly decreased in hypertensive patients (P < 0.05). Meanwhile, the vMMN peak latency was delayed in the hypertensive group (P < 0.05). However, the MMSE scores of patients with hypertension were not significantly different from those of controls (P > 0.05), and there was no significant correlation between the mean amplitude of vMMN and SBP, DBP, and MMSE in hypertensive individuals, respectively.

These data indicate dysfunction of automatically change detection processing in patients with hypertension. Moreover, the changes of vMMN provide a more objective and reliable assessment for cognitive impairment in hypertensive patients.