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Published on: May 3, 2018
Assessment of Arterial Stiffness Using the Cardio-Ankle Vascular Index
1Department of Cardiovascular Medicine, Okayama University, Graduate School of Medicine, Dentistry, and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Okayama, Japan.
Insights
The cardio-ankle vascular index (CAVI) offers a blood pressure-independent assessment of arterial stiffness, crucial for predicting cardiovascular disease outcomes. Higher CAVI values indicate increased arteriosclerosis and a poorer prognosis, but can be improved with disease management.
Area of Science:
- Cardiovascular Medicine
- Vascular Biology
- Diagnostic Imaging
Background:
- Arterial stiffness is a key predictor of cardiovascular disease outcomes.
- Traditional pulse wave velocity measurements are sensitive to blood pressure fluctuations.
- Accurate assessment of arterial stiffness is vital for patient management.
Purpose of the Study:
- To introduce the cardio-ankle vascular index (CAVI) as a blood pressure-independent measure of arterial stiffness.
- To evaluate CAVI's ability to detect early arteriosclerosis and assess disease severity.
- To explore CAVI's prognostic value and potential for guiding treatment.
Main Methods:
- Utilized the cardio-ankle vascular index (CAVI) for assessing arterial stiffness.
- CAVI measures overall arterial stiffness from the aorta to the ankle.
- Theoretical independence from concurrent blood pressure measurements.
Main Results:
- CAVI increases with age and is elevated in arteriosclerotic disease.
- CAVI better reflects coronary artery disease severity than brachial-ankle pulse wave velocity.
- Higher CAVI values correlate with poorer patient prognosis.
- CAVI levels can be reduced through management of diabetes and hypertension.
Conclusions:
- CAVI aids in early arteriosclerosis detection and treatment monitoring.
- It provides a quantitative measure of disease progression and treatment effectiveness.
- Further research is needed to confirm if CAVI-guided therapy improves prognosis in high-risk individuals.
Background:
Arterial stiffness is an independent predictor of outcomes for patients with cardiovascular disease. Although measurement of pulse wave velocity is a widely accepted, noninvasive approach for the assessment of arterial stiffness, its accuracy is affected by changes in blood pressure.
Summary:
The cardio-ankle vascular index (CAVI) is an index of the overall stiffness of the artery from the origin of the aorta to the ankle and is theoretically independent of blood pressure at the time of measurement. CAVI increases linearly with age and is elevated even in mild arteriosclerotic disease. It can identify differences in the degree of arteriosclerosis among patients with severe arteriosclerotic disease and better reflects the severity of disease of the coronary artery than does brachial-ankle pulse wave velocity. Patients with higher CAVI values show a poor prognosis compared with those with lower CAVI values. Furthermore, CAVI can be lowered by controlling diabetes mellitus and hypertension.
Key Messages:
The primary aims of assessing arterial stiffness using CAVI are to assist in the early detection of arteriosclerosis, allowing timely treatment and lifestyle modification, and to quantitatively evaluate the progression of disease and the effectiveness of treatment. Whether CAVI-guided therapy can improve prognosis in high-risk patients needs to be further examined to confirm the clinical usefulness of this measure.
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