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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Effects of Nifedipine on Blood Pressure, Arterial Compliance and Left Ventricular Mass in Elderly Patients with Isolated Systolic Hypertension

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The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of acute and chronic administration of slow-release nifedipine (SRN) on blood pressure (BP), aortic index (AI), average wall stress (AWS), left ventricular mass (LVM), and other hemodynamic parameters in elderly patients with isolated systolic hypertension (ISH) (systolic blood pressure [SBP] > 175 mmHg). We studied 10 patients (mean age 73.7 ± 5.6 years) in which after a washout period, in basal conditions, 3 h after the administration of SRN (20 mg), and 180 days after chronic therapy (40 mg daily), we evaluated the changes of BP, HR, AI, AWS, LVM, and other parameters obtained by means of echocardiography. After SRN we observed a significant decrease of SBP both in acute (P < 0.005 in supine and P < 0.0125 in upright position) and in chronic (P < 0.0005 in supine and P < 0.005 in upright position) therapies and a slight decrease of DBP, whereas HR did not show great changes. AI decreased significantly (P < 0.01 in acute and in chronic) as well as did systemic vascular resistance (P < 0.025 in acute and P < 0.01 in chronic). Moreover, we observed a significant diminution of AWS (P < 0.01) and LVM (P < 0.01) after 180 days of treatment. These results seem to show that SRN is useful in elderly patients with ISH, because it produces an improvement both of arterial compliance and of left ventricle function parameters.