Abstract

BACKGROUND: Systemic arterial compliance is sometimes derived by echocardiographic stroke volume to pulse pressure ratios. Few studies have assessed echocardiographic arterial compliance in blacks or its associations with explicit, rather than composite, cardiovascular disease (CVD) outcomes. METHODS: We analyzed a subset (n = 1,887) of blacks (mean age = 59 ± 6 years; 65% women) in the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities study who were free of prevalent CVD and were imaged by echocardiography in 1993-1995. Arterial compliance was calculated by the aortic velocity time integral and brachial pulse pressure ratio (VTI/PP). Associations between VTI/PP and subsequent CVD (defined as first incident stroke, coronary event, or heart failure) were modeled by Cox regression after controlling for demographics, anthropometry, and cardiac risk factors. For comparison, CVD hazard ratios were also calculated for pulse pressure quartiles. RESULTS: Over a mean follow-up of 13 ± 4 years, 237 subjects (12%) developed coronary disease, 322 (16%) developed heart failure, and 180 (9%) experienced a stroke. Hazard ratios contrasting lowest with highest quartiles of VTI/PP were 2.3 (95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.7-3.1) for composite CVD, 2.1 (95% CI = 1.3-3.2) for coronary disease, 2.5 (95% CI = 1.7-3.6) for heart failure, and 2.7 (95% CI = 1.6-4.5) for stroke. Hazard ratios contrasting widest with narrowest pulse pressure quartiles were 1.7 (95% CI = 1.3-2.2) for composite CVD, 1.6 (95% CI = 1.0-2.4) for coronary heart disease, 1.8 (95% CI = 1.2-2.6) for heart failure, and 2.3 (95% CI = 1.3-3.9) for stroke. CONCLUSIONS: In blacks, the VTI/PP ratio has stronger associations with both composite and individual CVD outcomes than does pulse pressure.