Ascending aortic blood pressure waveform is related to coronary atherosclerosis in hypertensive as well as in normotensive subjects

Ascending aortic blood pressure-derived indices were shown to be related to coronary atherosclerosis. However, no study so far has analyzed the relation between ascending aortic pulsatility and the extent of coronary atherosclerosis in normotensives. Therefore, the aim of the present analysis was to assess the relation between central blood pressure-derived indices and the presence and extent of coronary artery disease in patients with and without hypertension. The study group consisted of 821 patients (590 men and 231 women; mean age: 57.3 +/- 10.0 years) with preserved left ventricular function (ejection fraction>50%) undergoing coronary angiography. Hypertension was diagnosed in 639 (77.8%) patients. Ascending aortic blood pressure during catheterization was measured. After multivariate stepwise adjustment the odds ratio (OR) and confidence interval (CI) of coronary artery disease was: pulsatility per standard deviation (SD) OR 1.36 (95% CI 1.01-1.82) in hypertensives and OR 3.96 (1.95-8.07) in normotensives; pulsatility index per SD OR 1.36 (95% CI 1.01-1.85) in hypertensives and OR 4.41 (2.03-9.56) in normotensives. Stepwise linear regression analysis revealed that pulsatility is related to the mean stenosis in the coronary tree in hypertensives (beta = 0.0862, SE = 0.0448, p<0.05) as well as in normotensives (beta = 0.1704, SE = 0.0718, p<0.05). In conclusion, ascending aortic pulsatility is related to the extent of coronary atherosclerosis irrespectively of the presence of hypertension.