The impact of aerobic exercise on blood pressure variability.

There is increasing evidence that blood pressure variability (BPV, variation of blood pressure over time) constitutes a strong and independent marker of cardiovascular risk. The all-cause mortality is >50% greater in subjects with a standard deviation of inter-visit blood pressure >5 mm Hg. Regular aerobic exercise reduces blood pressure and is recommended by current hypertension guidelines as a basic lifestyle modification. It remains elusive, however, whether aerobic exercise is able to reduce BPV as well. In total, 72 hypertensive subjects were randomly assigned to an 8–12-week treadmill exercise program (target lactate 2.0±0.5 mmol l−1) or sedentary control. Blood pressure was measured by 24 h-ambulatory blood pressure monitoring (ABP). Two aspects of BPV were assessed: the variability of ABP and the variability of blood pressure on exertion. The coefficient of variation (CV) was used as a statistical measure of BPV. The CV of systolic daytime ABP was defined as primary outcome. The exercise program significantly decreased systolic and diastolic daytime ABP by 6.2±10.2 mm Hg (P 0.05 each). Regular aerobic exercise is a helpful adjunct to control blood pressure in hypertension, but it has no effect on 24 h- BPV, an independent predictor of cardiovascular risk.