Prevalent Hypertension and Stroke in the Sleep Heart Health Study: Association with an ECG-derived Spectrographic Marker of Cardiopulmonary Coupling

The electrocardiogram (ECG)-based sleep spectrogram generates a map of cardiopulmonary coupling based on heart rate variability and respiration derived from QRS amplitude variations. A distinct spectrographic phenotype, designated as narrow-band elevated low frequency coupling (e-LFCNB), has been associated with central apneas and periodic breathing and predicts sleep laboratory failure of continuous positive airway pressure therapy. This study assesses, at a population level, the associations of this spectrographic biomarker with prevalent cardiovascular disease using the Sleep Heart Health Study (SHHS)-I dataset. Retrospective analysis of the Sleep Heart Health Study-I dataset. Laboratory for complex physiologic signals analysis. The fully-automated ECG-derived sleep spectrogram technique was applied to 5247 (of the original 6441) poly-somnograms from the SHHS-I. Associations were estimated with use of various drugs and pathologies including prevalent hypertension and cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease. Increasing with age and more common in males, e-LFCNB is also associated with greater severity of sleep apnea and fragmented sleep. After adjustment for potential confounders, an independent association with prevalent hypertension and stroke was found. An ECG-derived spectrographic marker related to low frequency cardiopulmonary coupling is associated with greater sleep apnea severity. Whether this biomarker is solely a sign of more severe disease or whether it reflects primary alterations in sleep apnea pathophysiology (which may either cause or result from sleep apnea) is unknown. This ECG-based spectral marker is associated with a higher prevalence of hypertension and stroke.