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Vascular compliance as a measure of biological age
C J Bulpitt1, C Rajkumar, J D Cameron
1Section of Geriatric Medicine, Imperial College School of Medicine, Hammersmith Hospital, London, UK.
Objectives:
To determine the measure of vascular compliance most closely related to age.
Design:
A review of 22 studies relating aortic compliance to age and a discussion of other factors related to vascular compliance.
Measurements:
Aortic compliance, elastic modulus, postmortem aortic changes, pulse wave velocity in the aorta, common carotid, lower limb and upper limb.
Results:
1. Aortic compliance and carotid artery compliance is closely related to age; 2. Compliance in the peripheral arteries, in 16 reports, appears less closely related to age; 3. There is evidence that aortic compliance is related to hypertension, cardiac function, and left ventricular hypertrophy and can be increased by exercise, hormonal therapy, antioxidant and antihypertensive treatment; and 4. Vascular compliance is more closely related to chronological age than other measures such as skin inelasticity, greying of hair, baldness etc.
Conclusions:
Because of the close relationship between aortic and carotid compliance and chronological age, deviation from the age-predicted norm (biological age) may prove to be a good predictor of cardiovascular pathology.