Umeå universitets logga

The human heart and lungs constitute an intricate and dynamic system. Various clinical physiological examinations can be used to evaluate cardio-pulmonary function and identify abnormalities. Thus, it is important to understand how normal physiology presents, to be able to identify pathological findings. To distinguish normal from abnormal findings in a patient population compared to healthy controls, adequate, accurate and up-to-date reference materials are required. 

There is currently a lack of well-established sex and age specific reference materials that clearly state boundaries of normality for electrocardiography (ECG) variables. For lung function examinations there are several different reference materials available, being discordant between ethnicities. In addition, the relation between lung function, age, sex, and height has generally been difficult to model in an optimal way. This highlights the need for more adequate sex-specific models regarding age- and height-dependency of spirometry variables. 

Heart rate variability (HRV) is a method for evaluating the autonomic nervous system (ANS) and its influence on heart rate and blood pressure. Autonomic disturbances are characterized by an imbalance between the sympathetic and the parasympathetic nervous systems. It is well known that decreased HRV is associated with increased mortality. Autonomic imbalances are also associated with various pathological conditions, of which rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and ischemic heart disease (IHD) are studied in this thesis.

The purpose of this thesis was to describe the properties of different clinical physiological examinations and to investigate reference values relating to cardiovascular and pulmonary function in healthy individuals regarding age and sex. In addition, the aim was to assess the relationship between HRV, RA and CVD both cross sectionally and longitudinally. 

In a subjectively healthy population (n=219) of varying age, there were age and sex-dependent differences in ECG examinations. This emphasizes former findings and supports the need to establish age- and sex-specific reference values in the future. 

Lung function examinations in subjectively healthy persons (n=285) support and emphasize that the reference values presented by the Global Lung function Initiative (GLI) underestimate the pulmonary function in the adult Swedish population. The study showed that the model used in GLI can be updated with new values that are specific for the Caucasian population in Sweden. 

Patients with RA (n=50) presented with lower HRV than healthy controls (n=100) during autonomic provocation tests, both at baseline examinations and after five years. This indicates a cardiac autonomic imbalance. Furthermore, increased systolic blood pressure was associated with reduced HRV, thus a decrease in HRV could be a risk marker for developing arterial hypertension in this patient group.

Females with IHD (n=197) presented with lower HRV compared to controls (n=141) at baseline, and a higher mortality rate after 15 years. The higher mortality rate was only present in females < 60 years of age. For measurements obtained in the upright position, HRV was higher in females that died during follow-up compared to those who were alive. 

This thesis emphasizes the importance of validated and updated sex- and age- specific reference materials, and models that are well suited for different clinical physiological examinations. Additionally, HRV examinations exposed changes in the ANS related to RA as well as IHD, where findings were shown to be persistent over time and particularly pronounced during provocations. In the future, HRV assessment could be a useful tool to identify the increased risk of developing hypertension in patients with RA, or to customize treatment based on ANS response as the field of personalized medicine continues to evolve.