Objective: To assess the reliability and validity of an FFQ to evaluate dietary patterns of Na consumption among low-income and low-literacy Brazilian hypertensive subjects. Design: The initial FFQ was submitted to content analysis with the pre-test administered to fifteen subjects. Reliability was evaluated according to the reproducibility criterion, with interviewer administration of the FFQ twice within a 15 d interval. Validity was assessed against a 24 h recall (132 subjects), a 3 d diet record (121 subjects) and a biomarker (24 h urinary Na; 121 subjects). To test the correlation with the biomarker, discretionary salt was added to the FFQ Na values. Setting: A large urban teaching hospital in south-eastern Brazil. Subjects: The study was based on 132 randomly selected subjects (eighty-three women and forty-nine men) aged 18 to 85 years. Results: Kappa coefficients ranged from 0?79 to 0?98, confirming the reproducibility of the FFQ. There was no correlation between urinary Na excretion, the FFQ and the 24 h recall for the general sample, although significant correlations had been observed when methods were summed up (24 h recall 1 discretionary salt 1 FFQ; 0?32, P 5 0?01). The addition of discretionary salt significantly improved the biomarker-based FFQ validity, with correlation coefficients varying from 0?19 (general sample) to 0?31 (female sub-sample). Conclusions:The developed FFQ demonstrated satisfactory evidence of validity and reliability and can be used as an important complementary tool for the evaluation of Na intake among Brazilian hypertensive subjects.

The association of lifetime shift work exposure with PC2 and PC3 suggests that shift work promotes unfavourable changes in autonomic cardiac control related to a decrease in parasympathetic modulation and an increase in blood pressure.

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In order to investigate the response of heart rate variability (HRV) components to postural change and their association with cardiovascular risk factors in shift workers, a cross-sectional study with 438 Brazilian males rotating shift workers was done. Anthropometric, body composition, and clinical measures were collected. Electrocardiogram was recorded for 3 minutes, in the supine and orthostatic position, and HRV components were extracted. Descriptive analyses showed that mean values of body mass index, waist circumference (WC), waist-to-height ratio, visceral fat area (VFA), and blood pressure (BP) were higher than the reference values. In the regression model, age, WC, VFA, and systolic BP showed negative association with HRV components. These findings suggest the need for determining effective strategies for the evaluation and promotion of health among shift workers focused on the altered variables.

These data suggest that hypertensive women homozygous for the TLR6 249Ser polymorphism might exhibit lower LV wall thickness and reduced TLR6-mediated inflammatory response than females carrying the major allele.