Background and Objectives：The pulse wave velocity (PWV) reflects arterial stiffness, which is related to atherosclerotic vascular damage. This cross-sectional study was performed to evaluate the relation of the PWV with 10-year cardiovascular risk, as assessed by the revised Framingham risk scoring and European SCORE system. Subjects and Methods： Using an automatic wave form analyzer, the heart-femoral (hf) and brachial-ankle (ba) PWVs were simultaneously measured in 327 subjects (men：women 195：132 and age 49.7±7.5 years) without clinical atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, diabetes or systemic disease. The Framingham (FRS) and the SCORE (SRS) risk scores were obtained. Results： The FRS and SRS were both significantly correlated with hfPWV and baPWV (r=0.412 and 0.398 and r=0.554 and 0.603, respectively, p<0.001 for all results). Both PWVs differed significantly between risk categories (<10, 10-20 and >20%) and (<5 and ≥5%) by the FRS and SRS, respectively. A logistical regression analysis demonstrated that an hfPWV >920 cm/s or baPWV >1400 cm/s was an independent variable for the discrimination of a more than moderate risk (≥10%) stratification by the FRS. An hfPWV >975 cm/s or baPWV >1600 cm/s was an independent variable for the discrimination of a high risk (≥5%) stratification by the SRS. Conclusion：Both PWVs correlated significantly with the FRS and SRS, but their correlation coefficients were not high. The simply measured baPWV may be useful in stratifying cardiovascular risk, which is comparable to hfPWV. (Korean Circulation J 2005;35:22-29)

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Background:Increased aortic stiffness is a independent risk factor of cardiovascular disease in patients with hypertension. Acute changes of the heart rate (HR) have been reported not to affect the aortic stiffness in pacing. However, it is unknown whether acute changes in HR caused by sympathomimetics can affect the aortic stiffness in patients with hypertension. We investigated the effect of acute changes in HR produced by isoproterenol on the aortic stiffness in 17 hypertensive patientss (mean age: 59±9 years).Methods :All vasoactive drugs were discontinued at least 3 days before the study. The carotid-to-femoral pulse wave velocity (PWV) was measured by the foot-to-foot method. The pulse waves were recorded at the baseline and at every increase of HR by 5 to 10 bpm with a gradual increase of the dose of isoproterenol. The blood pressures and HR were measured simultaneously. For the analysis, HR, PWV, compliance (C), and compliance index (Ci) were converted as percent changes (Δ) from the baseline values. Percent changes of the parameters of the aortic stiffness, i.e., ΔPWV, ΔC, and ΔCi, were grouped by every 10% increase in ΔHR.Results :There was no significant difference among groups in ΔPWV, ΔC and ΔCi (p>0.05 for each of the group). The regression analysis showed no significant correlation of ΔHR with ΔPWV and ΔC (r=0.18, 0.13 respectively, p>0.05 for each). ΔCi had a poor correlation with ΔHR (r=0.22, p<0.05). However, only 4.6% of ΔCi could be referred to ΔHR (r2=0.046).Conclusion :Aortic stiffness was not affected by acute changes in HR produced by isoproterenol which suggests that it is not necessary to consider acute changes in HR when measuring aortic PWV.

Background and ObjectivesIn patients with coronary vasospastic angina we investigated whether exercise ECG test results vary with the different modes of exercise load and compared various clinical characteristics, including coronary risk factors, between patients with positive and those with negative exercise test results. Materials and MethodsThis study examined 34 patients who had documented coronary artery spasm without significant stenosis coronary artery luminal diameter narrowing 70 . The two different modes of treadmill exercise ECG tests, the first based on the Bruce's protocol graded exercise test, GET and the second on the sudden rapid exercise protocol non-graded exercise test, NGET , were performed in the morning of the same day. Results Of 29 patients who underwent both GET and NGET, 19 patients manifested a positive result by NGET, whereas only 11 did by GET 66 vs. 38 , p 0.04 . All patients with a positive GET result produced a positive NGET result and 8 of 18 patients with a negative GET result also did. Of 34 patients who underwent GET, there was no significant difference in the frequency of hypertension, diabetes, current smoking, history of effort chest pain, mixed disease fixed stenosis 50 , 70 of luminal diameter or in total cholesterol level between patients with positive and those with negative results. Among 18 patients with typical variant angina by clinical history, 8 of 10 patients with high disease activity 5 or more attacks per week exhibited a positive result by either GET or NGET, whereas 4 of 8 patients with low disease activity did 80 vs. 50 , p NS . Conclusion In patients with coronary vasospastic angina, sudden rapid exercise has the potential to induce coronary artery spasm more frequently than multistage exercise. Exercise test results may not be correlated with coronary risk factors, coronary anatomy, effort chest pain, and the disease activity. Korean Circulation J 2001 ; 31 9 : 857-866

Primary malignant mesothelioma of the pericardium is a very rare and highly lethal neoplasm. Diagnosis is a difficult problem and most of the cases reported in the literature were diagnosed at postmortem . We report a case of primary malignant mesothelioma of the pericardium in a 22 year-old man CT and MR imaging both showed diffuse irregular pericardial thickening , soft tissue density with cystic lesion , nodular bulging into the myocardium , permeative growth of the tumor , and encasement of the heart and tw。 great vessels Index Words: Pericardium , MR Pericardium , CT Pericardium , neoplasms Addr ess reprint r equests to :