Association between intima-media thickness,plaque characterstics of the carotid artery and coronary artery disease in essential hypertensive patients

Objective To study the association between intima-media thickness(IMT),plaque characteristics of the carotid artery and coronary artery disease(CAD)in essential hypertension(EH) patients.Methods According to the result of coronary angiography,73 cases with EH were divided into simple EH(group A,20 cases),EH with heart muscle ischemia(group B,38 cases)and EH with myocardial infarction(group C,15 cases).The IMT,atherosclemtic plaques,scoring of atherosclerosis and the percentage of detection of arterial plaque were tested by carotid ultrasound.Results(1)IMT,scoring of atherosclerosis were obviously higher in group C than tthose in group A(P0.01) and group B(P0.05),also those in group B were higher than those in group A(P0.05).(2)The percentage of detection of arterial plaque was significantly higher in group B and in group C than those in group A(P0.05),there was no significantly difference between group B and group C(P0.05).(3)The percentage of detection of soft and ulcerated plaques in group C was significantly higher than that in group A(P0.01)and in group B(P0.05).Conclusion IMT and plaque characteristics of the carotid artery measured by ultrasound in EH patients are useful indexes in prediction of coronary atherosclerosis,which can be used to evaluate CAD and its severity.