Association of the Human Y Chromosome With High Blood Pressure in the General Population

Abstract

Genetic variation in the Y chromosome has significant effects on male blood pressure in experimental animals, but the effects in humans are unknown. We examined the relationship between blood pressure and a polymorphic Hin dIII restriction site in the nonrecombining region of the Y chromosome in 409 randomly selected men from the general population. Carefully standardized measures of systolic and diastolic blood pressures were made. The Hin dIII restriction site was significantly more common (43.2%) in men in the lowest decile of the diastolic blood pressure distribution than men in the highest decile (15.9%, P =0.007). No significant difference in genotype frequency was observed between the lowest and highest deciles for systolic pressure (32.4% versus 27.8%, P =0.66). In the entire group, men with the Hin dIII restriction site had significantly lower diastolic blood pressures (81.2 mm Hg, SD:8.3, versus 83.2 mm Hg, SD:8.7, P =0.03). No significant differences in systolic blood pressure (130.6 mm Hg, SD:14.7, versus 128.3 mm Hg, SD: 13.6) were observed in relation to genotypes. Our results indicate that genetic variation in the human Y chromosome is associated with high blood pressure and contributes significantly to the quantitative variation of male diastolic blood pressure in the general population.