Age, gender and drug therapy influences on Tpeak-tend interval and on electrical risk score

Abstract Background and objectives Electrical risk score (ERS) has been proposed as easy, inexpensive test to stratify of sudden cardiac death (SCD) risk in subjects with normal left ventricular function. Potentially, aging, gender and drugs can influence ERS affecting two on six electrical markers, particularly, those based on the repolarization. Aim of this study was to establish aging, gender and drug therapy possible influences on ERS and mortality in elderly patients. Method 237 consecutive, low SCD risk-outpatients with asymptomatic and treated cardiovascular risk factors were analyzed. Six simple ECG markers composed ERS: heart rate (>75 bpm); left ventricular hypertrophy (Sokolow-Lyon criteria); delayed QRS transition zone (≥V4), frontal QRS-T angle (>90°), long QTBazett; long T peak to T end interval (Tp-e). We obtained ERS in 237 outpatients, grouped according age ( Results Two-hundred-thirty-seven patients were grouped respectively in the following age classes: Conclusion Aging was associated to the ERS and repolarization phase derangement. Tp-e should be considered a marker of total mortality rather than SCD in the over sixty years old patients.