Re: Is there any established relationship between red hair and hypertension?

Interesting question.... The short answer is that I was unable to find any 
study whatsoever that examining the association between red hair and 
hypertension; thus it seems there is no established relationship between 
the two. 

WARNING!!!! Most of the following is entirely speculative based on a very 
superficial review of tangential evidence!!!

The fact that no research on this topic specifically exists does not, of 
course, mean that there couldn't be some relationship between hair color 
and hypertension. Hair color is certainly associated with other disease 
states; I'm sure you are aware that redheads are at increased risk for skin 
cancer, for example. I was also able to find a study that found a 
significantly higher rate of endometriosis among women with red hair 
compared to non-redheads. There may be some relationship between graying 
hair and risk for heart attacks (reference below), and the concentration of 
various chemical elements in hair can be used to discriminate between 
individuals with and without hypertension; concentrations of these elements 
may vary  based on hair color. So, if I want to be very creative, I might 
speculate along the following lines:

1) The genes for red hair may be linked to genes associated with 
susceptibility to various medical conditions; therefore, it is possible 
that such a genetic link could exist for hypertension

2) Individuals with red hair could be more prone to premature graying (I 
could find no evidence to support or refute this speculation); premature 
graying may be associated with increased risk for cardiovascular disease.

3) Metabolism of certain chemicals associated with hypertension may differ 
among people based on hair color.

By the way, although I'm familiar with the folklore about red hair and 
temper, I'm not aware of any studies demonstrating that redheads are more 
prone to be hot-tempered that others (and any such studies would have to 
control for cultural factors, such as Irish ethnicity, before I'd be 
convinced!).

The bottom line is, there is no established relationship between hair color 
and hypertension, but I don't think such a relationship is impossible and 
it has not been ruled out any more than it has demonstrated.

References:

Woodworth, SH, Singh, M., et al (1995). A prospective study on the 
association between red hair color and endometriosis in infertile patients. 
Fertility and Sterility 64(3):651-2.





Schnohr, P., Lange, P. et al. (1995). Gray hair, baldness, and wrnkles in 
relation to myocardial infarction: the Copenhagen City Heart Study. 
American Heart Journal 132(6):1003-10.

Shtangeeva, I & Kulikov, V. (1995). Study of chemical element behavior in 
health and disease by means of neutron activation analysis and multivariate 
statistics. Nutrition 11(5 Suppl):592-4.