Disease –Age- Correlated Oxidative Status of Patients with Hypertensive and Diabetic Co-Morbidity in Central Hospital, Benin City, Nigeria

The study was designed to compare oxidative status of sufferers of a co-morbidity of hypertension and diabetes mellitus who have clinical evidence of sustained well controlled blood sugar and blood pressure with that of apparently healthy controls and to see if the variation of this oxidative status with progression (age) of the co-morbidity differ from the observations in previous studies with sufferers of solitary hypertension or diabetes. Blood samples were collected from  co-morbidity sufferers (n = 42; 17 males and 25 females ) and 42 apparently healthy volunteers for the determination of plasma levels of two endogenous antioxidant enzymes  (superoxide dismutase, SOD, and catalase, CAT) as well as markers of oxidative damage (malondialdehyde, MDA, and erythrocyte osmotic fragility, EOF). Results obtained showed that the blood levels of both SOD and CAT decreased significantly (P<0.001) as age of co-morbidity increases. Also levels of blood MDA and EOF increased with age of co-morbidity (P<0.001). The variation of these indices with disease age was more statistically significant than that observed in earlier studies with solitary diabetes or hypertension. This study shows that oxidative damage is worse in sufferers of hypertensive and diabetic co-morbidity than in sufferers of solitary diabetes or hypertension