Artikel
Non-invasive measurements of increased vascular tone in patients with essential hypertension
Nicht-invasive Bestimmung des erhöhten Gefäßtonus bei Patienten mit essentieller Hypertonie
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Veröffentlicht: | 8. August 2006 |
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Gliederung
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We assessed arterial vascular tone during sleep in patients with essential hypertension and normotensive control subjects. Arterial vascular tone was obtained by non-invasive digital photoplethysmography and an algorithm for continuous, investigator-independent, automatic analysis of digital volume pulse. Arterial tone was quantified by the reflective index. The reflective index was derived from the digital pulse wave as the mean value of the data points from 93 ms to 218 ms adjacent to the inflection point.
In patients with essential hypertension we observed a significantly higher arterial vascular tone during the first half of the night compared to age-matched normotensive control subjects (30.7±0.3; n=21 vs. 29.5±0.3; n=20; mean±SEM; p<0.05 by ANOVA with Bonferroni's post-hoc test). During the second half of the night the elevated reflective index was not significantly different between patients with essential hypertension and normotensive control subjects (30.0±0.3; n=21 vs. 30.7±0.3 n = 20).The increased arterial vascular tone indicated systemic vasoconstriction as confirmed by cold pressure tests. It is concluded that non-invasive technique can determine an increased systemic arterial vascular tone in patients with essential hypertension throughout the night at sleep.