Relationship of choroidal thickness with pulsatile hemodynamics in essential hypertensive patients

Abstract

Controversy exists about the association of choroidal thickness (CTh) with blood pressure (BP) values. There is some evidence suggesting that central hemodynamics changes are associated with microvascular disease. Our study was aimed to assess the relationships between CTh and clinic and 24-h BP and between CTh and estimated 24-h aortic pulse pressure (aPP), 24-h aortic systolic BP (aSBP), and 24-h aortic augmentation index (aAIx) in a group of hypertensive patients. We enrolled 158 hypertensive subjects (mean age 48 ± 13 years) all of which underwent evaluation of the choroidal district by Swept-Source optical coherence tomography (SS-OCT) and 24-h BP monitoring, in order to measure peripheral BP and to estimate central hemodynamic parameters. Inverse significant correlations of clinic PP, 24-h aPP, 24-h aSBP, and 24-h aAIx with thicknesses of central ring, inner ring, and outer ring of the choroid and its overall average were found. The strongest of these correlations was that relating 24-h aPP with overall average choroidal thickness (r = −.531; P