Correlation Between Arterial Stiffness and Plasma Endothelin-1 Concentration in Man with Obesity

Background.Obesity is associated with increase arterial stiffness and el-evated plasma endothelin-1 concentration. However, there is still conflict-ing data regarding the effect of obesity on arterial stiffness and plasma endothelin-1 concentration. Objective.The purpose of the current study was to assess this effect and analyze whether there was correlation between arterial stiffness indices and plasma endothelin-1 concentration. Methods.The design of the study was cross sectional study that compare and correlate arterial stiffness and plasma endothelin-1 concentration be-tween obesity group (n=40) and normoweight group (n=40). Obesity was defined as body mass index = 25 kg/m2. Arterial stiffness was as-sessed by measuring carotid-femoral pulse wave velocity (PWV) dan stiffness index () non-invasively using ultrasound method. Endothelin-1 was measured by ELISA. Results.There was no significant difference regarding PWV between obesity and normoweight group (mean SD: 809.44 137.77 versus 850.96 211.60 cm/s, p=NS), but was significantly higher in obese group (8.79 3.15 versus 7.28 1.96, p=0.012). PWV and corre-lated significantly with age (PWV: r=0.446, p<0.001, : r=0.354, p=0.001), but only correlated with body mass index (r=0.282, p=0.011) and waist circumference (r=0.312, p=0.005). There was no significant difference between obesity and normoweight group regard-ing plasma endothelin-1 concentration (0.94 0.26 versus 0.95 0.18 pg/dl, p=NS). There are no significant correlations between PWV/and plasma endothelin-1 concentration. Conclusions.These findings suggest that the effect of obesity on arterial stiffness is not uniformly seen throughout all arterial region. Obesity im-pact on carotid artery is greater than its impact on aorta, and this impact on arterial stiffness is not mediated by endothelin-1.