Hypertension is related to sodium intake, and many patients with essential hypertension are overweight and have the metabolic syndrome. We therefore studied microsatellite markers close to the thiazide-sensitive Na-Cl cotransporter on chromosome 16 and a quantitative trait locus for abdominal obesity-metabolic syndrome (AOMS2) on chromosome 17, which have been found to be linked to hypertension in a previous genome scan in Chinese. There were 84 hypertensive subjects (44 men, 40 women, age 53+/-13 years) and 88 normotensive controls (40 men, 48 women, age 54+/-13 years) recruited. Specific oligonucleotide primers were used to amplify genomic DNA spanning the microsatellite markers D16S3396 and D17S1303 that consist of ATA and GATA repeats, respectively. We did not find any association between D16S3396 and blood pressure. In contrast, the distribution of D17S1303 genotypes differed between hypertensive subjects and normal controls (P = 0.014). The number of GATA repeats correlated inversely with diastolic blood pressure (r = -0.18, P = 0.02) and body mass index (r = -0.12, P = 0.01). Nine GATA repeats in D17S1303 were associated with hypertension (OR 2.19, 95% CI 1.08-4.44, P = 0.027), while 14 GATA repeats were associated with normotension (OR 0.26, 95% CI 0.10-0.66, P = 0.002). The diastolic blood pressure in those with or without the (GATA)9 allele was 85.9+/-13.6 and 79.2+/-13.6 mmHg respectively (P = 0.01), and in those with or without the (GATA)14 allele it was 73.8+/-11.0 and 81.8+/-14.0 mmHg respectively (P = 0.003). Our results provide further evidence that a gene predisposing to hypertension in Chinese is in the vicinity of the microsatellite D17S1303.