Why the study?
Does intravenous conjugated estrogen improve common carotid artery distensibility in normotensive postmenopausal women?
Does intravenous conjugated estrogen improve common carotid artery distensibility in normotensive postmenopausal women?
Acute administration of conjugated estrogens improves common carotid artery elasticity in healthy postmenopausal women, though the effect diminishes with increasing age and time since menopause.
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Acute estrogen was associated with improved carotid distensibility in postmenopausal women; hypothesis-generating and requires randomized confirmation before clinical consideration.
BACKGROUND: Various vascular effects of estrogens have been proposed to explain further the beneficial effect of replacement therapy in cardiovascular events. HYPOTHESIS: The study was undertaken to assess the effect of conjugated estrogen on the elastic properties of the large arteries in normotensive, healthy, postmenopausal women. METHODS: Toward this end, we investigated the acute effect of conjugated estrogen on the elastic properties of the common carotid artery (CCA) in 20 normotensive, healthy, postmenopausal women (age 54+/-3 years) at baseline and 20 min after the intravenous administration of 1.25 mg conjugated estrogens. The CCA distensibility was derived by a combination of surface ultrasonographic data and simultaneous blood pressure measurements at the brachial artery. The carotid pulsatility index, a measure of brain impedance, was determined electronically by tracing the CCA Doppler waveform. RESULTS: At baseline, CCA distensibility had a negative correlation with both patients' age and time since menopause (r = -0.57 and r = -0.48, p < 0.05 for both cases). After estrogen administration, estradiol and estrone plasma levels were restored to the range of usual premenopausal values. Estrogen induced a significant increase in CCA distensibility by 0.92+/-0.005 dyne(-1) x cm2 x 10(-6) (from 2.03 to 2.95 dyne(-1) x cm2 x 10(-6)) and a significant reduction in CCA pulsatility index by 0.24+/-0.06, (from 2.17 to 1.93) (p < 0.001 for both cases). The improvement in CCA distensibility had a negative correlation with both patients' age and time since menopause (r= -0.46 and r = -0.44, respectively, p < 0.05 for both cases). CONCLUSIONS: Acute conjugated estrogen administration induced an improvement in CCA elasticity and a reduction in brain impedance in normotensive, postmenopausal women. As the age of women and the time since menopause increased, the improvement in carotid distensibility decreased in such selected subjects.
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Kallikazaros et al. (2002) studied this question.
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