Large brachial artery diameter and diabetes in post-menopausal women.
OBJECTIVE
Vascular remodelling is one of the possible compensatory mechanisms in response to artery wall injury. It was demonstrated that post-menopausal women with carotid atherosclerosis had a larger brachial artery diameter (BAD) than women without carotid plaques. Therefore, it is possible to hypothesise that artery enlargement could be a marker of early atherosclerosis. To investigate the eventual association between carotid and brachial artery diameter and disease affecting the vascular wall, we performed a case-control study in post-menopausal women with or without type II diabetes mellitus.


RESULTS
We enrolled 28 cases (with diabetes) and 56 controls (without diabetes) matched for age and carotid atherosclerosis presence and severity. On the t-test, women with diabetes showed significantly larger brachial and common carotid artery diameters and, as expected, higher plasma glucose level and homeostasis model assessment (HOMA) than women without diabetes. On the univariate analysis, only plasma glucose level results correlated to BAD in the whole sample. Multivariate analysis confirmed that diabetes was a good predictor of brachial and carotid artery diameter, while age, systolic blood pressure and triglycerides were correlated only to the carotid diameter.


CONCLUSIONS
Our data confirm that vascular remodelling is a systemic process occurring in conditions related to atherosclerosis, such as type II diabetes. Indeed, artery diameter could be a marker of early response of vessel wall to injury.
Montalcini
T
T
University of Catanzaro, Catanzaro, Italy.
Gorgone
G
G
Gazzaruso
C
C
Garzaniti
A
A
Pujia
A
A
D000368:Aged; D001786:Blood Glucose / Q000032:analysis; D001916:Brachial Artery / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000473:pathology*; D002340:Carotid Artery Diseases / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000473:pathology*; D017536:Carotid Artery, Common / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000473:pathology; D003924:Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2 / Q000097:blood / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D017698:Postmenopause; D014463:Ultrasonography
D001786:Blood Glucose