Does brucellosis cause arterial stiffness and ventricular remodelling through inflammation?

摘要

Background Like other acute and chronic infections, Brucella infection leads to endothelial dysfunction. Furthermore, it has been suggested that the chronic inflammatory state present in chronic infectious diseases leads to an acceleration in atherosclerosis. For the prediction of CAD, it is possible to use epicardial fat thickness (EFT) as an adjunctive marker beside the classical risk factors, as it is easily and non-invasively evaluated by transthoracic echocardiography. The purpose of this study was to investigate the presence of impaired myocardial performance as well as of increased arterial stiffness and EFT in patients who had been infected with brucellosis in the past.