Correlations between clinical laboratory data and telomere length in the leukocytes of patients with hypertension

Aim: We investigated the correlation between age, telomere length of peripheral blood leukocytes and blood laboratory data of women with mild hypertension, to identify laboratory data that may reflect the biological aging process of individuals. Methods: The subjects were women with mild hypertension who were being treated with a low dose of amlodipine and who regularly visited the outpatient clinic of the Department of Cardiovascular, Respiratory, and Geriatric Medicine at Kyushu University Hospital. The laboratory data of patients were collected and the telomere length parameters in their peripheral blood leukocytes were determined by Southern blotting. We assessed the laboratory data and the telomere length parameters to determine any correlations. Results: The telomere length of the patients correlated positively with high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, albumin, hemoglobin levels and red blood cell counts, but negatively with globulin levels. Conclusion: Among the analyzed laboratory data, the albumin/globulin rates were the best candidate indicators for individual somatic genomic aging.