title: Effects of gender and age on heart rate variability in healthy individuals and in persons after sudden cardiac arrest.
abstract: The purpose of this study was to describe the effects of gender and age on heart rate variability (HRV) in healthy volunteers (n = 111; 40 men and 71 women) and in persons after sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) (n = 95; 79 men and 16 women). Frequency-domain measurements and six time-domain measurements of HRV (SDANN, 24-hour SD, SD, RMSSD, RR50, and %RR50) were taken. Two-factor analysis of variance was performed. In general, HRV was significantly lower in healthy women compared with healthy men in all the time-domain and frequency-domain variables except for the high-frequency components, RMSSD, RR50, and %RR50. There were no significant gender differences in the SCA sample. All the time-domain and frequency-domain measurements decreased with age in the healthy sample, but only the frequency-domain measurements decreased with age in the SCA sample.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physiological Nursing, University of Washington, Seattle 98195.
authors.forename: M J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Cowan
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Pike
authors.forename: R L
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Burr
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging; D015716:Electrocardiography, Ambulatory; D005260:Female; D006323:Heart Arrest / Q000503:physiopathology*; D006339:Heart Rate; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012016:Reference Values; D012727:Sex Characteristics