Hepatocyte growth factor and 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring

In recent years, many growth factors and cytokines have been shown to be related to arteriosclerosis, and hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) has been reported to be associated with hypertension. In the present study, we investigated the relationship between HGF and hypertension by measuring the serum HGF concentration and performing 24-h ambulatory blood pressure monitoring (ABPM) in 47 randomly selected male and female subjects who underwent a medical examination for cardiovascular disease. The results were as follows. 1) The mean serum HGF concentration in the subjects was 0.35+/-0.14 ng/ml. 2) The serum HGF concentration was positively correlated with both the nighttime systolic and diastolic blood pressures (r=0.42, p<0.05 and r=0.47, p<0.01, respectively). 3) No correlation was found between serum HGF concentration and daytime systolic or diastolic blood pressure. 4) When subjects were divided into two groups based on the difference between daytime and nighttime systolic blood pressure, i.e., a group in which the difference was less than 10 mmHg and a group in which the difference was 10 mmHg or more, the HGF concentration was significantly higher in the former group (0.39+/-0.14 vs. 0.30+/-0.12 ng/ml, p<0.05); similarly, when subjects were divided into a group in which the difference between daytime and nighttime diastolic blood pressure was 5 mmHg and a group in which the difference was 5 mmHg or more, the HGF concentration was significantly higher in the former group (0.42+/-0.15 vs. 0.31+/-0.12 ng/ml, p<0.05). The results indicated that there is a relationship between blood pressure measured by ABPM and serum HGF concentration, and that this relationship might be an index of damage to blood vessels in patients with hypertension.