Associations of microalbuminuria and blood pressure with carotid, aortic and femoral atheromatous plaques in elderly Finns

Eighteen subjects were microalbuminuric and 176 subjects normoalbuminuric. MA was associated with diabetes mellitus and high systolic and diastolic BP. The subjects were divided into two groups according to the median total number of carotid, aortic and femoral plaques: ≥9 versus 0-8 plaques. A high number of plaques were associated with hypertension, male gender, smoking and MA. When the study subjects were stratified according to hypertension, it turned out that MA was associated with a high number of plaques in hypertensive, but not in nonhypertensive subjects. According to the results of logistic regression analysis with a high number of plaques as the dependent variable, the unadjusted OR for smoking was 6.0 (95% CI 2.4-15.3) in hypertensive subjects. Microalbuminuria was of borderline statistical significance (OR 4.5, 95% CI 0.9-22.9). After adjustment for systolic blood pressure and fasting glucose concentration, the OR for microalbuminuria was reduced to 3.3 (95% CI 0.6-18.4).