Metabolic syndrome is related to vascular structural alterations but not to functional ones both in hypertensives and healthy subjects

Background and aims: Metabolic Syndrome (MS) has been related to an impairment in arterial structural and functional properties with heterogeneous results. In this paper we focused on the effects of MS on arterial carotid-femoral PWV and common carotid IMT in two different populations, one of hypertensive patients and one of healthy controls. Methods and results: We enrolled 816 consecutive HT and 536 healthy controls. Vascular structural (IMT) and functional (PWV) properties were evaluated. NCEP-ATP-III criteria were used for diagnosis of MS. MS was diagnosed in 26.9% and 6.9% in hypertensive and control subjects, respectively. PWV was similar in controls with and without MS (7.7 ? 1.9 vs 7.6 ? 1.1 m/s, p = 0.69), while IMT was higher in controls with than those without MS (0.64 ? 0.18 vs 0.57 ? 0.13 mm, p = 0.02). Hypertensives with MS were older (57.9 ? 12.2 vs 52.7 ? 14.1 years, p < 0.001) and showed higher PWV (9.0 ? 2.3 vs 8.4 ? 2.1 m/s, p = 0.001) and IMT (0.72 ? 0.22 vs 0.65 ? 0.17 mm, p < 0.001) than those without MS, however at the age-adjusted analysis only the difference in IMT was confirmed (p = 0.007). Regression models showed that MS was an independent determinant of IMT in both controls (13 = 0.08, p = 0.03) and hypertensives (13 = 0.08, p = 0.01), but not of PWV either in controls (13 = 0.006, p = 0.886 and 13 = 0.04, p = 0.19, respectively). Conclusions: the main finding of our work is that MS is a significant determinant of IMT while this is not the case for PWV. This result have been confirmed both in hypertensive subjects and in healthy controls. ? 2020 The Italian Diabetes Society, the Italian Society for the Study of Atherosclerosis, the Italian Society of Human Nutrition and the Department of Clinical Medicine and Surgery, Federico II University. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.