Cross-sectional comparison of endothelial function and microvascular reactivity across age groups and cardiovascular health status
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Introduction: Aging and factors such as hypertension, obesity, and diabetes increase the risk of cardiovascular diseases. A key precursor of cardiovascular diseases is compromised vascular function. While endothelial function and microvascular reactivity decline with age, few studies have examined how they are further affected by cardiovascular health status. Objective and Hypothesis: This retrospective analysis compares peripheral endothelial function and microvascular reactivity between young, middle-aged and older adults living with or without cardiovascular risk factors. We hypothesized that endothelial function and microvascular reactivity is lower in older adults compared to middle-aged and younger adults and that they are further reduced in the presence of cardiovascular risk factors. Methods: Peripheral endothelial function (brachial artery flow-mediated dilation, FMD) and microvascular reactivity (post occlusive reactive hyperemia) were measured in 241 participants divided into three groups: a) 19 healthy young adults (9 males/10 females, 18–35 years old, BMI: 22.1 ± 2.8 kg/m 2 ); b) 34 healthy middle-aged adults (3 males/ 31 females, 43–57 years old, BMI: 23.4 ± 3.4 kg/m 2 ); c) 64 middle-aged adults living with at least 1 cardiovascular risk factor (42 males/ 22 females, 41–59 years old, BMI: 28.9 ± 5.6 kg/m 2 ); d) 18 healthy older adults (9 males/ 9 females, 60–79 years old, BMI: 25.9 ± 2.5 kg/m 2 ); e) 104 older adults living with at least 1 cardiovascular risk factor (70 males/ 34 females, 60–84 years old, BMI: 29.5 ± 5.6 kg/m 2 ). Healthy participants were free of cardiovascular risk factors. Participants living with cardiovascular risk factors presented with at least one of the following: hypercholesterolemia, hypertension, type 2 diabetes, smoking. Results: Among healthy adults, brachial artery FMD decreased with age (young: 4.10 ± 2.36%, middle-aged: 3.24 ± 3.28%, older: 3.57 ± 1.52%, p=0.01). FMD was further reduced in older adults living with cardiovascular risk factors (2.89 ± 2.09%, p=0.05 vs. healthy older adults). Among healthy adults, microvascular reactivity was lower with middle-age (young: 1.79 ± 0.55 ml/mmHg, middle-age: 1.09 ± 0.47 ml/mmHg, older: 1.99 ± 0.93 ml/mmHg, p<0.01). In the presence of cardiovascular risk factors, microvascular reactivity was greater in middle-aged adults (1.73 ± 0.72 ml/mmHg, p<0.01 vs. healthy middle-aged) but did not differ in older adults (1.53 ± 0.91 ml/mmHg, p=0.07 vs. healthy older). Conclusion: These results suggest that the decline in peripheral endothelial function associated with age is exacerbated by the presence of cardiovascular risk factors. In contrast, microvascular reactivity is not consistently affected by age or cardiovascular health status. Montreal Heart Institute Foundation This abstract was presented at the American Physiology Summit 2025 and is only available in HTML format. There is no downloadable file or PDF version. The Physiology editorial board was not involved in the peer review process.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".