Lack of association between ACE gene polymorphism and left ventricular hypertrophy in essential hypertension

Blood pressure variability predicts cardiovascular events independently of traditional cardiovascular risk factors and target organ damage

“…In contrast to some [10][11][12][13][14] but not all previous work [15,31], we found only a very weak association between BP variability and TOD [Sokolow-Lyon voltage and DBP 6-24months SD and DBP 6-24months Range (both b ¼ 0.04, P < 0.01)]. This is rather surprising, as previous work [3] has indicated that, especially in high cardiovascular risk populations, BP variability may be more relevant than average BP values in the development, progression and severity of TOD.…”

“…Instead, BP variability was mainly correlated with the severity of SBP elevation, consistent with our findings. However, in contrast to the present study, the study by Gómez et al [15] was underpowered, and BP variability was measured over a 24-h period and therefore actually not long-term BP variability over 6 months as in the present study.…”

“…However, the lack of association between BP variability and LVH after 2 years of follow-up could partly be due to the fact that all the patients were selected to have LVH already at baseline. To our knowledge, there has been only one previous study [15] investigating the association between long-term BP variability and LVH. Using 43 untreated hypertensive patients, Gómez et al [15] showed that neither short-term nor long-term BP variability was associated with LVH.…”

“…To our knowledge, there has been only one previous study [15] investigating the association between long-term BP variability and LVH. Using 43 untreated hypertensive patients, Gómez et al [15] showed that neither short-term nor long-term BP variability was associated with LVH. Instead, BP variability was mainly correlated with the severity of SBP elevation, consistent with our findings.…”

“…Increased BP variability has also been shown to be associated with target organ damage (TOD), such as increased urine albumin/creatinine ratio (UACR) [10][11][12][13] and left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) [13,14]. Although studies investigating the association between UACR and BP variability have looked at both long-term [10][11][12] and short-term (within 24 h) [13] BP variability, the studies [13][14][15] investigating the association between BP variability and LVH have mostly examined short-term BP variability. Furthermore, studies [3,16,17] comparing long-term and short-term BP variability suggest that long-term BP variability is a better predictor of cardiovascular events, especially in treated hypertensive participants.…”