Aortic stiffness is increased in polymyalgia rheumatica and improves after steroid treatment

Background Inflammatory rheumatic diseases have been associated with increased cardiovascular risk and arterial stiffness. Polymyalgia rheumatica (PMR), a disease which affects primarily older people, is characterised by a systemic inflammatory response but little is known about aortic involvement in PMR. A study was undertaken to investigate whether aortic stiffness is increased in PMR and whether it improves after steroid treatment. Methods Thirty-nine patients with PMR (age 72±8 years, 44% men, blood pressure (BP) 134/75±16/9 mm Hg) and 39 age-, sex- and BP-matched control subjects underwent aortic pulse wave velocity (PWV) determination. Aortic augmentation as a measure of the impact of the reflection wave on central haemodynamics was also measured and corrected for heart rate. Twenty-nine of the patients were re-examined after 4 weeks of treatment with prednisone at a dose of 15 mg/day. Results Aortic PWV was higher in patients with PMR than in control subjects (12.4±4 vs 10.2±2 m/s, p Conclusions Polymyalgia rheumatica is associated with increased aortic stiffness which may improve upon reduction of systemic inflammation induced by treatment with glucocorticoids.