In a recent study, researchers investigated carotid-femoral pulse wave velocity (cfPWV) as a predictor of cardiovascular (CV) risk in patients with psoriatic arthritis (PsA) compared to healthy controls. According to the findings published online in Rheumatology and Therapy, the study authors found that cfPWV, a marker of aortic stiffness, was significantly higher in patients with PsA even after adjusting for confounding factors. Additionally, cfPWV was independently associated with PsA disease duration (P=0.001), age (P<0.001), systolic arterial pressure (P<0.001), glomerular filtration rate (inverse: P=0.001), and red cell distribution width, a marker of major adverse CV events (P=0.02). The European Society of Cardiology’s SCORE system identified elevated CV risk in 8.73% of patients with PsA, whereas cfPWV revealed increased aortic stiffness and end-organ disease in 16.00% of the same cohort. These findings suggest that cfPWV measurements could aid in identifying subclinical CV complications and guiding risk assessment in this patient population.
