Association between nondipper behavior and serum calcium in hypertensive patients with mild-to-moderate chronic renal dysfunction.

A nondipping BP pattern has been shown to be predictive of end-organ damage, cardiovascular events, and mortality. The mechanisms of blunted nocturnal BP fall are multifactorial. We assessed whether total corrected serum calcium and ionic calcium (iCa) are associated with a blunted nocturnal BP fall in both treated and untreated hypertensive patients with stages 1–3 of the National Kidney Foundation Kidney Disease Outcomes Quality Initiative (NKF KDOQI). Clinical data and 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring were obtained in a cohort of 231 essential hypertensive patients. Among the entire cohort, 107 were nondippers and 124 were dippers. Only in nondippers, we found significant correlations between iCa and 24-hour systolic blood pressure (SBP; r = 0.21, P < .03), diurnal SBP (r = 0.21, P < .03), and 24-hour pulse pressure (PP; r = 0.23, P < .02). The ambulatory arterial stiffness index (AASI) was significantly related with 24-hour PP in both dippers and nondippers after adjusting for age. Both AA...