Associations of resting heart rate with endothelium-dependent vasodilation and shear rate

ABSTRACT

Heart rate is an independent risk factor for cardiovascular disease and a hemodynamic factor that can modulate blood flow as it affects the frequency of shear stimuli acting on the arterial wall. However, the association between heart rate and endothelium-dependent vasodilation remains highly controversial. We determined the association between heart rate at rest and endothelium-dependent vasodilation in 98 apparently healthy adults (18–63 years). The mild and positive association between heart rate and flow-mediated dilation (FMD) was no longer significant when age and sex or baseline diameter were controlled for. The path analyses revealed that heart rate was not directly related to FMD but the association was indirectly mediated by shear rate, which was confirmed by a bias-corrected bootstrap 95% CIs (0.0157–0.1056). We concluded that even though heart rate and endothelium-dependent vasodilation were associated with shear rate, there was no independent relation between heart rate and FMD.

Keywords:

• Atherosclerosis
• blood flow
• flow-mediated dilation
• heart rate at rest
• shear stress

Declaration of interest

No conflicts of interest, financial or otherwise, are declared by the authors.