Various approaches for vascular health in elderly women.

Cardiovascular disease is one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality in elderly women. Several previous studies evaluated various cardiovascular risk factors, such as brachial blood pressure (BP), systolic blood pressure (SBP), pulse pressure (PP), pulse wave velocity (PWV), central aortic pressure (CAP), and so on. More recently, measurement of ambulatory blood pressure (AMBP) was shown to be superior to clinic measurements in predicting cardiovascular mortality. However, the data are limited concerning the relationship among these variables in elderly women. In the present study, the data for clinic BP including PP, PWV, CAP, and AMSBP and AMCAP obtained using BPro were evaluated in 24 elderly hypertensive women. Although there was a significant correlation between AMSBP and AMCAP, no correlations were found between repeated measured values and values measured in the clinic on one occasion. In conclusion, measuring PWV and CAP in the clinic in patients with white coat hypertension or masked hypertension may not be an accurate way to measure these parameters.