Table 4.
Cardiovascular markers, neuroendocrine markers and symptoms in HTx recipients and healthy controls
| HTx recipients | Healthy controls | p valuea | Adj. p valueb | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cardiovascular markers | ||||
| Systolic blood pressure, supine—mmHg, mean (SD) | 131.5 (14.9) | 125.4 (14.6) | 0.040 | 0.082 |
| Diastolic blood pressure, supine—mmHg, mean (SD) | 78.9 (8.4) | 78.1 (9.1) | 0.638 | 0.960 |
| Left ventricular ejection fraction—%, mean (SD) | 58.5 (5.4) | 58.2 (4.6) | 0.799 | 0.164 |
| Neuroendocrine markers | ||||
| Plasma NT-pBNP—ng/l, median (IQR) | 901 (926) | 51 (66) | < 0.001 | < 0.001 |
| Plasma norepinephrine—pmol/l, median (IQR) | 2072 (1844) | 2041 (1139) | 0.697 | 0.375 |
| Urine norepinephrine:creatinine ratio—nmol/mmol, median (IQR) | 9.0 (7.2) | 12.2 (8.3) | 0.046 | 0.178 |
| Plasma epinephrine—pmol/l, median (IQR) | 577 (405) | 563 (373) | 0.563 | 0.577 |
| Urine epinephrine:creatinine ratio—nmol/mmol, median (IQR) | 1.5 (1.2) | 1.7 (1.2) | 0.175 | 0.665 |
| Symptoms | ||||
| Orthostatic symptoms—total score, mean (SD) | 0.7 (0.8) | 0.5 (0.8) | 0.206 | n.a.c |
| Pale and cold hands—score, mean (SD) | 1.6 (1.2) | 1.3 (0.9) | 0.038 | n.a.c |
Numbers in bold indicate a p value < 0.05
NT-pBNP N-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptide, SD standard deviation, IQR interquartile range, HTx heart transplant
aBased upon Chi square test, Fisher’s exact test, Student t test, or Mann–Whitney U test, as appropriate
bAdjusted according to group differences in activity levels (steps/day)
cNot applicable, as the statistical prerequisites for linear regression-based adjustment were not met