Arterial stiffness and hormone replacement use in healthy postmenopausal women

Background. Arterial stiffness has been shown to be positively related to cardiovascular disease risk. Little, how-ever, is known about the influence of hormone replacement use on arterial stiffness in females. Methods. Arterial pulse wave velocity (PWV) and carotid augmentation index (AI, applanation tonometry) were mea-sured in 34 healthy postmenopausal women, including users (n = 18) and nonusers (n = 16) of hormone replacement. Results. There were no significant group differences in any of the physical characteristics including resting blood pressure. None of the measures of arterial stiffness differed between users and nonusers of hormone replacement. Conclusions. The present cross-sectional study indicates that reduced arterial stiffness does not appear to be a likely mechanism contributing to the lower incidence of cardiovascular disease in postmenopausal women taking hormone replacement. HORMONE (estrogen) replacement therapy (HRT) isassociated with reduced cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk in postmenopausal women (1). Although mech-anisms including a favorable plasma lipid and lipoprotein profile have been suggested (1), as much as 50 % of this beneficial effect remains unexplained. Arterial stiffness recently has been shown to be positively related to CV