Oral Microbiome Linked to Incident HTN in Postmenopausal Women

WEDNESDAY, March 2, 2022 (HealthDay News) -- Among postmenopausal women, specific oral bacteria are associated with blood pressure (BP) status and the risk for hypertension development, according to a study published online March 2 in the Journal of the American Heart Association.

Michael J. LaMonte, Ph.D., M.P.H., from the University at Buffalo-SUNY in New York, and colleagues collected subgingival plaque samples, measured BP, and obtained medical and lifestyle histories and medication inventory for 1,215 women (mean age, 63 years) at baseline (1997 to 2001). Microbiome composition of subgingival plaque was measured. Baseline measured BP was defined as normotensive (429 women), elevated (306 women), or prevalent treated hypertension (480 women). During a mean follow-up of 10.4 years, incident hypertension was defined as newly physician-diagnosed hypertension.

The researchers identified 47 bacterial species that differed significantly according to baseline BP status in a cross-sectional analysis. Fifteen baseline bacterial species were significantly associated with incident hypertension, with 10 positive associations (age-adjusted hazard ratios, 1.10 to 1.16 per standard deviation in bacterial abundance) and five inverse associations (hazard ratios, 0.82 to 0.91). After further adjustment for demographic, clinical, and lifestyle factors, associations were materially unchanged; associations were similar when the analysis was restricted to the group of women who were normotensive at baseline.

"With these collective results, we add to a limited amount of published data on the human oral microbiome and BP, and, to our knowledge, we report the first prospective epidemiological results on the subgingival microbiome and hypertension incidence in aging women," the authors write.

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