AORTIC STIFFENING DOES NOT PREDICT CORONARY AND EXTRACORONARY ATHEROSCLEROSIS IN ASYMPTOMATIC MEN AT RISK FOR CARDIOVASCULAR-DISEASE

Stiffness of aortic walls has been shown to be a marker of coronary an d cerebrovascular diseases in patients with myocardial infarction or s troke. However, its value for predicting preclinical atherosclerosis h as not been demonstrated. Therefore, this study tested the association of aortic wall stiffness and coronary and extracoronary atheroscleros is in the absence of clinical cardiovascular disease. In 190 asymptoma tic men at cardiovascular risk, carotid-to-femoral pulse wave velocity (PWV) was measured mecanographically and the compliance of the aorta (C), as well as the intrinsic compliance (C-i), was deduced after corr ection for the effect of blood pressure. Also determined noninvasively were 1) the degree of coronary calcium deposit coded as grade 0, 1, 2 , or 3 using ultrafast computed tomography; 2) the extent of extracoro nary plaque detected by B-mode echography at three different sites (ca rotid, abdominal aorta, and femoral) coded as 0, 1, 2, or 3 diseased s ites; and 3) the estimated Framingham coronary risk. The grade of coro nary calcium was not associated with any aortic elastic parameter; The number of extracoronary diseased sites was not associated with PWV an d C but correlated negatively with C-i before but not after age adjust ment. The coronary risk correlated positively with PWV and negatively with C before but not after age adjustment and was not associated with C-i. In symptom-free subjects aortic stiffening does not predict the presence of coronary and extracoronary atheroma and therefore cannot b e considered as a useful surrogate marker of early atherosclerosis. (C ) 1998 American Journal of Hypertension, Ltd.