The relationship between panic disorder and hypertension. A review of literature

About 1/4 of the world's adult population suffers from hypertension. Due to the high prevalence of the disease, its impact on mortality and socio-economic costs, it is important to search for modifiable causes of its development. This review analyses studies in order to answer the question: Is there a higher prevalence of panic disorder in adults (≥18 years of age) with hypertension, than in normotensive group? There have been found 10 cross-sectional studies describing correlation between hypertension and panic disorder. Odds ratio for this two clinical entities ranged from OR = 3.31 (2.99-3.67) to OR = 1.19 (0.87-1.62). Moreover, frequency of coincidence of those two clinical entities was found between 4.2% and 18.75%. In the prospective studies there have been found a positive association between panic disorder and subsequent life-long development of hypertension OR= 1.7 (1.4-2.0). On the other hand, association between hypertension and subsequent development of panic disorder in the 12-months observation was OR = 3.23 (1.51-6.93), but in 3 years of observation it was insignificant OR = 1.12 (0.80-1.57). Based on the literaturereview, dueto the differences in methodology and the small number of prospective studies, it can only be suggested to clinicians that in some cases they should search for panic disorder in patients with hypertension, especially paroxysmal one.