Stiff arteries alone can cause high BP

Written by PTI | London | Updated: May 28 2014, 22:33pm hrs
A computer model of a 'virtual human' suggests that stiff arteries alone are enough to cause high blood pressure, scientists have warned.


"Our results suggest that arterial stiffness represents a major therapeutic target. This is contrary to existing models, which typically explain high blood pressure in terms of defective kidney function," said Klas Pettersen, a researcher at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences and first author of the study, published in PLOS Computational Biology.

High blood pressure is a major source of morbidity and mortality, because it makes individuals more prone to heart failure, stroke and kidney disease.

When blood pressure travels down the aorta from the heart, a special group of cells in the aortic wall, called baroreceptors, sense the pressure in this stretch of the

aortic wall and send signals with this information to the nervous system.

If the blood pressure is too high, these cells send stronger signals and the body is able to lower blood pressure.

However, if the aorta gets stiffer, as typically happens with age, this stretch of the aorta is not as sensitive as itonce was in measuring blood pressure.

Thus, although a person's blood pressure may have increased, the baroreceptors do not signal as intensively as they should and the body does not get the message to lower blood pressure.

"With the stiffening of the wall that follows ageing, these sensors become less able to send signals that reflect the actual blood pressure. Our mathematical model predicts the quantitative effects of this process on blood pressure," said Pettersen.

"If our hypothesis is proven right, arterial stiffness and baroreceptor signalling will become hotspot targets for the treatment of high blood pressure and the development of new medicines and medical devices," said Stig W Omholt from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, who was the senior investigator of the research project.

With the use of existing experimental data and models of the ageing human aorta, the researchers were able to show quantitatively how the stiffening of the aorta with age causes the baroreceptors to misinform the central nervous system about blood pressure, thus preventing the system from downregulating blood pressure.

The model predictions were compared with data from the Nord-Trondelag Health Study (HUNT2), which is composed of information on the health history of 74,000 people, including blood sample collection from 65,000 people.