BACKGROUND Mexican-Americans (MA) exhibit increases in various cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factors compared to non-Hispanic Whites (NHW), yet are reported to have lower CVD mortality rates. Our aim was to help explain this apparent paradox by evaluating endothelial function and urine albumin levels in MA and NHW. METHODS One hundred-five MA and 100 NHW adults were studied by brachial ar...

BACKGROUND Fibromuscular dysplasia (FMD) is a possible cause of stroke, especially in middle-aged women. However, only few reports are available on ultrasonographic detection and monitoring. METHODS Among the 15,000 patients who underwent color Doppler imaging (CDI) of the cervicocephalic arteries during the study period, all cases fulfilling ultrasound criteria of FMD were included into the ...

Fibromuscular dysplasia (FMD) involves small- and medium-sized arteries, being a well-known cause of hypertension in young Caucasian women, when renal arteries are involved. The etiology of FMD remains unknown, despite many theories. A genetic component is suspected to exist, because the pathology affects primarily Caucasians. Association between FMD and the HLA-DRw6 histocompatibility antigen ...

BACKGROUND The reproducibility of brachial artery flow-mediated vasodilatation (FMD) is limited by the operator dependence of most measurement methods. METHODS A new automated computerized analysis of brachial artery ultrasound scan providing a continuous evolution of the diameter during acute hyperemia, reactive to short hyperemia of the forearm and hand, was tested in 10 normal volunteers a...

The Global Foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) Research Alliance periodically reviews the state of FMD research to assess progress and to identify new priorities. In this supplement we provide an update of global FMD research, comprising (i) this overview paper, which includes background information with key findings, and papers covering (ii) epidemiology, wildlife and economics, (iii) vaccines, (iv) ...

BACKGROUND The relationship between impaired brachial flow-mediated dilation (FMD) and subsequent clinical cardiovascular events is not well established, especially in older adults whose FMD is often diminished. We assessed the hypothesis that FMD predicts incident cardiovascular events in a population-based cohort of older adults. METHODS AND RESULTS FMD was measured at the 1997 to 1998 Card...

BACKGROUND Acute mental stress may contribute to the cardiovascular disease progression via autonomic nervous system controlled negative effects on the endothelium. The joint effects of stress-induced sympathetic or parasympathetic activity and endothelial function on atherosclerosis development have not been investigated. The present study aims to examine the interactive effect of acute mental...

To characterize brachial artery flow-mediated dilatation (FMD) in children, we monitored arterial diameter changes with ultrasound between 40 and 180 s after a 4.5-min forearm cuff occlusion-induced hyperemia in 105 healthy children (mean age, 11 yr; range, 9-16 yr). The peak FMD was 7.7 +/- 4.0% and occurred 79 +/- 33 s after cuff release. FMD at 60 s (5.3 +/- 4.0%) was significantly lower tha...

Smoking has a significant impact on patients with FMD. Diagnosis of FMD may have been delayed in patients who had ever smoked, because symptoms could have been attributed to smoking-related disease. Smokers with FMD had significantly higher rates of claudication, aneurysm, and need for therapeutic intervention. Of note, therapeutic interventions for non-FMD indications were excluded from analys...