Exaggerated morning blood pressure surge and cardiovascular events. A 5-year longitudinal study in normotensive and well-controlled hypertensive elderly

Cardiovascular events (CE) occur most frequently in the morning hours in hypertensive subjects. We studied the association between the morning blood pressure (BP) surge and CE in prognosis of 10 normotensive and 32 well-controlled hypertensive elderly, in whom ambulatory BP monitoring was performed and who were followed prospectively for 5 years. The morning surge (MS) of BP was calculated as mean systolic BP during 2 h after awakening - mean systolic BP during 1 h that included the lowest sleep BP. During an average of 60 months, five CE occurred. When the patients were divided into two groups according to MS, those in the top terzile (MS group; MS ≥ 34 mmHg, n = 14) had a higher prevalence of CE (5 versus 0, p = 0.001) during the follow-up period, than the others (non-MS group; MS < 34 mmHg, n = 28). The logistic regression analysis showed the MS sleep-trough surge as predictive variable of CE (odds ratio, OR = 0.794, p = 0.022). In conclusion, in older normotensives and well-controlled hypertensives, a higher BP MS is associated with vascular risk independently of clinical and ambulatory BP. Reduction of the MS could thus be a therapeutic target for preventing vascular events also in non-hypertensive patients. © 2008 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.