Essential Hypertension in Infancy and Childhood

Introduction Essential hypertension is the principal cause of persistently elevated blood pressure in adults.1In children, by contrast, essential hypertension is rare; renal diseases, diseases of the central nervous system, coarctation of the aorta, and endocrine disturbances are the commonest etiological factors.* In view of the paucity of reported cases of essential hypertension in the pediatric literature, it seemed worthwhile to present the cases with this condition encountered at the Children's Medical Center, Boston. We shall emphasize the salient points in differential diagnosis and discuss the therapeutic approaches.