[Resources for the diagnosis of hypertensive cardiopathy at the primary care level]

Hypertensive cardiomyopathy is nowadays the most precious, prevalent and fatal condition of all cerebral, renal and arterial complications that leads to arterial hypertension. Left ventricular hypertrophy is the basis of the macroscopic structural damage that belongs to this entity. Basically, this complication produces, in the daily practice, alterations in the systolic and dyastolic functions, myocardial ischemia and arrhythmias. At present, it is obvious that we need to take better advantage of resources to diagnose hypertensive cardiopathy, and that the cost of explorations are lower must imply an agreement between cardiologists and general practitioners. In this article, we review the resources available at general practice level for the efficient diagnosis of the complications produced by hypertensive cardiopathy.