Brachial -- ankle pulse wave velocity is a simple and independent predictor of prognosis in patients with acute coronary syndrome.

Background: Although a very simple method of measuring brachial -- ankle pulse wave velocity (baPWV) has become available in a clinical setting, whether baPWV can predict future cardiovascular events remains uncertain. We examined whether baPWV is a predictor of cardiovascular events in patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS).
Methods and Results: baPWV measurement was performed in 215 consecutive patients with ACS. During the follow-up period (26+/-10 months), 46 patients experienced post-hospitalization cardiovascular events (18 patients experienced a major event (eg, stroke, re-admission for heart failure or cardiac death), and 28 patients experienced coronary re-intervention). A receiver operating characteristic curve demonstrated that the best cut-off point of a baPWV for predicting a post-hospitalization cardiovascular event was 17.00 m/s and that for predicting a major cardiovascular event was 18.00 m/s. After the adjustment for the conventional risk factors influencing the prognosis, a multivariate Cox proportional hazards model demonstrated that both cut-off points of baPWV had a significant hazard ratio for a post-hospitalization event: 5.47 (2.69-11.09) and for a major cardiovascular event: 9.22 (2.78-30.56).
Conclusions: baPWV is a simple predictor of the prognosis of patients with ACS that is independent of conventional risk factors for ACS.