There is a linear relationship between resting heart rate (HR) and mortality in normotensive and untreated hypertensive individuals. However, it is not clear whether HR is a marker of increased risk in hypertensive patients on treatment. We investigated the relationship between HR and mortality in patients with hypertension. We analyzed baseline HR, final HR, and HR change during follow-up in p...

OBJECTIVE Interhemispheric and intrahemispheric balance models may be integrated to gain an increased understanding of how cerebral systems are involved in the regulation of heart rate and blood pressure. We sought to examine the relationship between left and right frontal and posterior activity and resting heart rate and blood pressure. Based on this integration, we predicted that lateral (lef...

Cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) has been shown to improve quality-of-life, functional status, exercise capacity, and survival in patients with left ventricular systolic dysfunction, moderate to severe heart failure symptoms, and a wide QRS. Controlled, randomized CRT trials have used atrial sensing to provide atrial-synchronized biventricular pacing, but have not focused on atrial pacin...

Heart rate increases are a fundamental adaptation to physiological stress, while inappropriate heart rate increases are resistant to current therapies. However, the metabolic mechanisms driving heart rate acceleration in cardiac pacemaker cells remain incompletely understood. The mitochondrial calcium uniporter (MCU) facilitates calcium entry into the mitochondrial matrix to stimulate metabolis...

OBJECTIVE To investigate potential associations between resting heart rate, blood pressure and the product of both, and the brachial-ankle pulse wave velocity (baPWV) as a maker of arterial stiffness. METHODS The community-based "Asymptomatic Polyvascular Abnormalities in Community (APAC) Study" examined asymptomatic polyvascular abnormalities in a general Chinese population and included part...

OBJECTIVE To prospectively assess the safety and efficacy of ivabradine in patients with idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy. METHODS We included 35 patients with idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy with an ejection fraction (EF) <40% and heart rate >70 beats/min despite optimal medical therapy, according to the international guidelines in this prospective, non-randomized, single-arm, open-label ...

BACKGROUND A higher resting heart rate is associated with an increased probability of cardiovascular complications and premature death in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. The impact of heart rate on the risk of developing microvascular complications, such as diabetic retinopathy and nephropathy, is, however, unknown. The present study tests the hypothesis that a higher resting heart rate...