The Relationship Between Hypertension and Cognitive Decline

In the last 20 years, more than 700 papers were written about the relationship between hypertension and cognition. Hypertension precedes in more than 15 years the onset of dementia. The white matter lesions, the burden and his progression, are the most important risk factors for cognitive decline. This vascular brain injury negatively impacts on the frontal lobe and produces a disconnection between prefrontal cortex and the subcortical structures. The clinical expression of this damage is executive dysfunction, the most common cognitive domain affected. Twenty percent of the hypertensive patients with mild cognitive impairment, especially the non-amnestic form, it will develop Alzheimer dementia. The Alzheimer dementia is the most common type among hypertensive or patients with vascular disease. The early detection of the cognitive impairment and the antihypertensive treatment have and important role in the prevention of Alzheimer and vascular dementia.