Reference values of pulse wave velocity in healthy people from an urban and rural argentinean population

Abstract

In medical practice the reference values of arterial stiffness came from multicenter registries obtained in Asia, USA, Australia and Europe. Pulse wave velocity (PWV) is the gold standard method for arterial stiffness quantification; however, in South America, there are few population-based studies. In this research PWV was measured in healthy asymptomatic and normotensive subjects without history of hypertension in first-degree relatives. Normal PWV and the 95% confidence intervals values were obtained in 780 subjects (39.8 ± 18.5 years) divided into 7 age groups (10-98 years). The mean PWV found was 6.84 m/s ± 1.65. PWV increases linearly with aging with a high degree of correlation (r (2) = 0.61; P < 0.05) with low dispersion in younger subjects. PWV progressively increases 6-8% with each decade of life; this tendency is more pronounced after 50 years. A significant increase of PWV over 50 years was demonstrated. This is the first population-based study from urban and rural people of Argentina that provides normal values of the PWV in healthy, normotensive subjects without family history of hypertension. Moreover, the age dependence of PWV values was confirmed.

Figure 1

Scatter graph showing the relationship between mean PWV (mean and CI 95%) and age in the study population (n = 780).

Figure 2

Evolution of the mean values of the pulse wave velocity (mean ± SD) according to age groups.

Figure 3

Mean values of pulse wave velocity (PWV: in meters per second) showing significant differences between young subjects (≤50 years) and subjects > 50 years included in the study. There were no significant differences of PWV in relation to gender for the same age group.