Relation between carotid plaques and risk factors for atherosclerosis in hypertensive and non-hypertensive subjects

Giulia Silveri

Abstract

 The aim of this stuy was to evaluate in hypertensive and non-hypertensive subjects thecorrelation between carotid plaques (CP) and several risk factors for atherosclerosis (age, smoking,diabetes mellitus, dyslipidemia, antihypertensive therapy, obesity, gender) as well as the meanvalues of blood pressure (BP) calculated on 24h, daytime and nighttime, using ambulatory BPmonitor. Eighty-nine patients (aged between 60 and 90 years) from the Geriatric Department of theUniversity of Trieste along the year 2019 were examined. The study was conducted according toDeclaration of Helsinki and all subjects gave their informed consent. The clinical classification ofsubjects with hypertensive BP was done according to 2013 ESH/ESC guidelines i.e. they had officesystolic BP (SBP) ≥ 140?mmHg or diastolic BP (DBP) ≥ 90?mmHg. Thus 48 patients were classified as hypetensive and 41 subjects as non-hypertensive. We calculated the percent occupied area ofblood vessel by CP using echo color Doppler scanning. BP was measured both in office and in ambulatory way carried out using a Holter BP Monitor. The relation between CP and risk factors was assessed by correlation coefficients. In non-hypertensive subjects, we found significant (>33%)positive correlations (p<0.04) between CP and smoking, age and mean values of SBP calculated on 24h, night and day periods and a significant (32%) negative correlation (p<0.05) with office DBP.Hypertensive subjects presented a significant (31%) positive correlation (p<0.05) between CP and age and a significant (31%) negative correlation(p<0.03) with mean values of DBP calculated on 24h, night and day periods.

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