The relationship of glycemic abnormalities between primary aldosteronism (PA) patients and essential hypertension (EH) patients is still debatable. This meta-analysis aimed to explore differences in the prevalence of glycemic abnormalities and levels of abnormal glucose metabolism in PA and EH patients.
A search was performed using
Twenty-six studies involving 53,186 patients were included in the meta-analysis. Patients with PA demonstrated significantly higher overall incidence of glycemic abnormalities than patients with EH [RR 1.54; 95% CI (1.20,1.98)]. Risk of diabetes mellitus (DM) and impaired glucose tolerance (IGT) in PA patients were higher than in EH patients [RR 1.27; 95%CI (1.08, 1.49) and RR 2.99; 95%CI (1.74, 5.16), respectively]. There was no statistically significant difference of risk between these groups for impaired fasting glucose (IFG) [RR 1.70; 95%CI (0.55, 5.26)]. Moderate heterogeneity was observed in overall glycemic abnormalities outcomes. A high level of heterogeneity was observed for IFG, while the level was low for DM and IGT.
PA patients have a higher risk of glycemic abnormalities than in EH patients. Further study should be conducted to investigate underlying mechanisms of glycemic abnormalities in PA.