Abstract-The purpose of this study was to evaluate the association of the insulin resistance syndrome with both blood pressure and target organ damage in blacks and whites with essential hypertension. Eighty-two black and 63 white French Canadian patients were studied. None had diabetes, and antihypertensive medications had been discontinued for Ն1 week. Key Words: hypertrophy Ⅲ glomerular filtration rate Ⅲ insulin resistance Ⅲ microalbumin Ⅲ race Ⅲ target organ damage R esistance to insulin-stimulated glucose uptake is a complex phenotype with both genetic and lifestyle contributory factors. The insulin resistance syndrome includes central obesity, hyperinsulinemia, dyslipidemia, hypertension, hypercoagulability, and an increased potential for developing atherosclerotic disease. 1 The possibility that insulin resistance and hyperinsulinemia may contribute to elevated arterial pressure in patients with essential hypertension has generated considerable interest, and a number of putative mechanisms have been proposed. 2-4 However, results of epidemiological and clinical studies describing the relationship of insulin resistance and/or hyperinsulinemia to hypertension or to the development of hypertension are conflicting. 5 Some reports suggest that the relationship between insulin resistance and hypertension is less striking in blacks than in whites. 6 Among hypertensives, both renal disease and cardiac disease have been related to the insulin resistance syndrome. Microalbuminuria is a strong predictor of cardiovascular and renal disease risk. 7 Several 8 -10 but not all 11,12 reports describe an association of plasma insulin concentrations and/or indexes of insulin resistance with microalbuminuria. Glomerular hyperfiltration, a functional renal change that precedes glomerulosclerosis, 13-15 is associated with obesity, 16 and obesity augments the effect of hypertension on albuminuria. 17 Furthermore, in obese hypertensives, higher glomerular filtration rate (GFR) is associated with insulin resistance. 18 Insulin exerts a growth-stimulating effect on cardiac myocytes and increases collagen production in fibroblasts. 19 Several studies suggest that insulin resistance and/or hyperinsulinemia also contribute to concentric left ventricular hypertrophy and diastolic dysfunction in normotensives and hypertensives. 20,21 Blacks are at greater risk for developing hypertension related target organ disease than whites. Hypertensive blacks have a greater rate of decline of renal function over time than do whites, 22 and black men have a 4-fold-higher incidence of