Post-ischemic skin peak oxygen saturation is associated with cardiovascular risk factors: a Swedish cohort study

The objective of this study was to explore the associations between skin microcirculatory function and established cardiovascular risk factors in a large Swedish cohort. As part of the Swedish CArdioPulmonary bioImage Study (SCAPIS), microcirculatory data were acquired at Linkoping University hospital, Linkoping, Sweden during 2016–2017. The subjects, aged 50–64 years, were randomly selected from the national population register. Microcirculatory reactivity was assessed using a 5-min arterial occlusion-release protocol. Comprehensive skin microcirculatory data were continuously acquired by using a fiberoptic probe placed on the lower right arm. After exclusion of missing data (208), 1557 subjects were remaining. Among the parameters, skin microcirculatory peak oxygen saturation after occlusion release, had the strongest relationship to the cardiovascular risk factors. The linear associations between peak oxygen saturation and cardiovascular risk factors were analyzed adjusted for age and sex. We found a negative association with peak oxygen saturation (standardized regression coefficient) for blood pressure (systolic −0.05 (95% CI: −0.10;-0.003) and diastolic −0.05 (−0.10; −0.003)), BMI −0.18 (−0.23; −0.13), waist circumference (males −0.20 (−0.32; −0.16), females −0.18 (−0.25; −0.11)), prevalent diabetes −0.31 (−0.49; −0.12), hypertension −0.30 (−0.42; −0.18), hyperlipidemia −0.24 (−0.40; −0.09), fasting glucose level −0.06 (−0.12; −0.01), HbA1c −0.07 (−0.12; −0.02), triglyceride level −0.09 (−0.14; −0.04), hsCRP −0.12 (−0.17; −0.07), and current smoker versus never smoked −0.50 (−0.67; −0.34). A positive association with peak oxygen saturation was found for cholesterol level 0.05 (0.005; 0.11) and HDL 0.11 (0.06; 0.17). This is the first study showing that post-ischemic skin microvascular peak oxygen saturation is associated with virtually all established cardiovascular risk factors in a population-based middle-aged cohort.