Regardless of normal indices of left ventricular LV chamber function it is believed that patients with hypertension have depressed LV midwall systolic shortening. A study published in the Journal of Cardiovascular Pharmacology explored the effects of short term therapy with cilnidipine on LV midwall fractional shortening mFS in hypertensive patients. Thirty seven patients with mild to moderate essential hypertension were subjected to a 2 week placebo run in period followed by 5 10 mg day of oral cilnidipine for 8 weeks. At the end of the placebo period and treatment patients were evaluated using echocardiogram measuring and calculating LV ejection fraction EF LV endocardial fraction shortening eFS and LV mFS. In comparison with the normotensive group the hypertensive patients had a significantly higher eFS and EF both at the end of the placebo period and at 8 weeks. Additionally mFS of patients with hypertension was lower at the end of the placebo period however at the end of 8 weeks mFS was not different than that of the control group. After cilnidipine treatment EF and eFS were found not to change however absolute mFS and corrected mFS increased significantly. There seemed to be no correlation between changes of mFS and changes of BP. Cilnidipine was shown to improve left ventricular systolic function mFS independently of BP changes in patients with hypertension.