Ambulatory blood pressure in patients with occult recurrent coarctation of the aorta

The hypothesis that mild recurrent aortic obstruction produces subtle changes in ambulatory blood pressure was investigated by performing 24-hour monitoring on 11 postoperative coarctation patients. Patients (age 16.1±2.7 years) were compared with normal controls (age 15.7±2.5 years, n=15). Surgery (end-to-end anastomosis) was performed at 6.0±1.0 years of age. There were no significant differences between patients and controls in terms of baseline blood pressure (right arm 123/78±4/3 mmHg versus 120/75±3/2 mmHg) or right leg systolic pressure (125±6 mmHg versus 123±4 mmHg). Of the 11 patients 8 had recoarctation by Doppler study (mean gradient 25.3±2.1 mmHg), 5 of 11 had a postexercise arm-leg pressure difference of>30 mmHg, and 6 patients had aortic diameters at the site of surgery <70% of the descending aortic diameter (by magnetic resonance imaging). There were no significant differences between the coarctation and control groups in terms of mean ambulatory systolic (125±3 mmHg versus 119±2 mmHg) or diastolic (69±2 mmHg versus 72±2 mmHg) pressures throughout the day. However, coarctation patients had a larger number of systolic pressures that exceeded the 95th percentile (18.2±5.6% versus 6.8±1.2%). These labile increases in systolic pressure correlated with residual coarctation (r=0.642, p=0.003). Ambulatory monitoring is a useful tool for detecting and monitoring subtle abnormalities of blood pressure control after coarctation repair.