title: [Short-term variability of blood pressure].
abstract: The regulation of blood pressure (BP) is traditionally described in terms of homeostasis, and indicates that BP although being continuously perturbed by external stimulations always displays the tendency to come back toward a reference set point. Experimental and clinical studies indicate that these fluctuations occurring around the average present a source of complementary information on the mechanism of cardiovascular control. Recently a wide variety of algorithm and models have been proposed to study the cardiovascular system through new technics of continuous non invasive BP or heart rate (HR) measurements. They give new insites for the evaluation of hypertensive patients and relevance to the understanding of the role of the disorder of the tonic regulation of BP, rather than its short-term variability or reactivity. However, if available data unequivocally indicate that the analysis of variability is a useful tool, the interpretation of those data in clinical trials is not always optimal because there is lot of interaction between BP, HR and other biological signals, and furthermore the use of laboratory data introduces problems to predict what happens on daily life ambulatory conditions.
authors.affiliation: Service de médecine interne et cardiologie, CHU Grenoble.
authors.forename: J P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Siché
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Laude
mesh_terms: D001341:Autonomic Nervous System / Q000503:physiopathology; D017704:Baroreflex; D001794:Blood Pressure; D001795:Blood Pressure Determination / Q000379:methods; D006339:Heart Rate; D006801:Humans; D006973:Hypertension / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000523:psychology; D010991:Plethysmography; D011187:Posture; D011379:Prognosis; D013315:Stress, Psychological