7D.03: RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN AGE AND STRUCTURAL ALTERATIONS IN SUBCUTANEOUS SMALL RESISTANCE ARTERIES IN HYPERTENSIVE XXXX .

@entity1 @entity101 @entity6 @entity1504 @entity413 @entity165
OBJECTIVE: It was proposed that early vascular ageing may be an important mechanism of @entity1504 in large conductance arteries. However it is not known whether aging may also affect small resistance artery morphology. DESIGN AND METHOD: For this reason, we investigated 100 @entity1 with essential @entity101 . Secondary forms of @entity101 were excluded according to standard clinical evaluations and biochemical or instrumental assessments. In all @entity1 , an evaluation of small resistance arteries morphology was performed by a wire micromyographic approach (Mulvany's technique). A small amount of subcutaneous tissue was obtained by local biopsy or during election surgery and subcutaneous small resistance arteries were dissected and mounted on a myograph; the media to lumen ratio (M/L) was then measured. RESULTS: The age range of our population was 22-81 years, with a mean value of 57  12 years; 14% of them were current smokers, 32% had alterations in lipid patterns, none of them had @entity6 , 58 were males and average blood pressure values were 156/95  19/12 mmHg.We found a significant correlation between M/L and age (r=0.30, p=0.002): the statistical significance of the correlation persisted after correction for counfounding variables (gender, serum @entity165 , smoking status, serum @entity413 , systolic or diastolic blood pressure values). A statistically significant inverse correlation was also observed between internal diameter and age (r=-0.20, p=0.046), while the correlation between age and media thickness did not reach statistical significance (r=0.09, p=0.37). CONCLUSIONS: Our data suggest that aging may affect microvascular structure in @entity101 @entity1 . It is also possible that @entity101 may anticipate the effects of physiological aging, and this should be explored in a relatively large population of normotensive subjects.
