title: Carotid ultrasonography for detection of vascular abnormalities in hypertensive children.
abstract: To determine whether hypertension and overweight status are associated with increased carotid intimal-medial thickness (cIMT) in children, vascular ultrasonography was performed in newly diagnosed hypertensive patients ( n=53) and normotensive controls ( n=33). Hypertensive subjects were identified either by referral or by systematic school-based hypertension screening. Hypertension was defined as blood pressure above the 95th percentile based on current Task Force criteria, and overweight was defined as body mass index (BMI) >25 kg/m(2). cIMT was assessed by high-resolution vascular ultrasonography of the distal common carotid artery. Hypertensive subjects had a higher cIMT than normotensive subjects (0.62 vs. 0.53 mm, P<0.00001). This difference remained significant after controlling for the effects of gender, race, age, height, weight, and BMI. Similarly, overweight subjects had a higher cIMT than normal-weight subjects (0.63 vs. 0.54 mm, P<0.0001). Subjects with both systolic and diastolic hypertension had higher cIMT than those with isolated systolic hypertension (0.67 vs. 0.60, P<0.05). cIMT showed significant positive pairwise correlation with age, height, weight, BMI, and systolic blood pressure. Among all clinical variables analyzed, cIMT was most strongly correlated with BMI ( r=0.53, P<0.001). These results provide further evidence that vasculopathy occurs in association with known cardiovascular risk factors such as hypertension and obesity during childhood.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, Texas 77030, USA. jonathan.m.sorof@uth.tmc.edu
authors.forename: Jonathan M
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Sorof
authors.forename: Andrei V
authors.initials: AV
authors.lastname: Alexandrov
authors.forename: Zsolt
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Garami
authors.forename: Jennifer L
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: Turner
authors.forename: Robert E
authors.initials: RE
authors.lastname: Grafe
authors.forename: Dejian
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Lai
authors.forename: Ronald J
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Portman
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001794:Blood Pressure; D015992:Body Mass Index; D002339:Carotid Arteries / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D002340:Carotid Artery Diseases / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology*; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D006973:Hypertension / Q000150:complications* / Q000453:epidemiology; D008297:Male; D009765:Obesity / Q000150:complications / Q000453:epidemiology; D012307:Risk Factors; D017539:Tunica Intima / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D017540:Tunica Media / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D014463:Ultrasonography