Clinical Research Directory

Arterial stiffness assessment will be performed by applanation tonometry with the patient being recumbent, 10 minutes before the measures were done. The carotid and femoral pulse will be acquired by applanation tonometry sequentially, allowing a single operator to acquire the measurement. The transit time from the R-wave of the simultaneously acquired electrocardiogram to the foot of the carotid and femoral pulse is measured. The difference acquired electrocardiogram to the foot of the carotid and femoral pulse is measured. The difference between these 2 transit times is divided by distances measured from the body surface to estimate the arterial path length in order to calculate carotid-femoral PWV.

Echocardiography will be performed on each patient at baseline; the measurements will be carried out according to the recommendations of the American Society of Echocardiography. Echocardiographic evaluation will provide information about cardiac anatomy (e.g. volumes, geometry, mass) and function (e.g. left ventricular function and wall motion, valvular function, right ventricular function, pulmonary artery pressure, pericardium).

NT-pro BNP, Syndecan-1, VCAM-1, Endoglin, NO and ADMA will be determined by specific enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) kits.

The aliquoted serum preserved at -80° C will be analysed by NMR using deuterated solvents (D2O, CDCl3, CD3OD, CD3CN), standards of metabolites and uremic toxins.