Influence of cardiovascular risk factors on longitudinal motion of the common carotid artery wall.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS:Carotid artery longitudinal wall motion (CALM) is a new biomarker, which can be measured together with carotid intima-media thickness and distensibility measurements in the same session. Our objective was to study the relationship between these indicators of vascular health and cardiovascular risk factors in a large and well-characterized study population. METHODS:The study population consisted of 465 subjects aged 30-45 years. Successful measurements were performed in 287 participants. RESULTS:The peak-to-peak and retrograde amplitudes of the longitudinal motion were inversely correlated with systolic blood pressure (SBP; r = -0.152, p<0.05 and r = -0.189, p<0.01), diastolic blood pressure (DBP; r = -0.170, p<0.01 and r = -0.256, p<0.001) and body mass index (BMI; r = -0.158, p<0.01 and r = -0.291, p<0.001). In addition, retrograde amplitude of longitudinal motion indirectly correlated with total cholesterol and triglycerides (r = -0.163, p<0.01 and r = -0.228, p<0.001, respectively). Amplitude of antegrade longitudinal motion was directly correlated with DBP, total cholesterol, LDL-cholesterol, triglycerides and BMI (r = 0.198-0.274, p<0.001 for all). Antegrade longitudinal motion increased and retrograde longitudinal motion decreased with the increasing number of cardiovascular risk factors. CONCLUSIONS:The magnitude of correlation coefficients between CALM parameters and risk factors was comparable with those for carotid intima-media thickness and distensibility. However, the correlation profile for various risk factors was different and CALM gives additional information regarding arteriosclerosis and risk factors.