Hypertension screening in the eye clinic.

We studied the suitability of the eye clinic as a site for hypertension detection with attention to the ophthalmologist's role in the broad context of hypertension control. Sixty of 300 consecutive eye clinic patients were referred to their primary care physician for re-evaluation of an elevated blood pressure recording. Only seven of these were started on therapy or had a change made in their existing regimen by the primary physician. When the benefit to this small percentage is weighed against the potential effects of such a high "false positive" referral rate we cannot support the proposal that the ophthalmologist does more good than harm by measuring the blood pressure of every patient.