Malamani GD, Preti P, Mariotti S, Savino S, Lusardi P, Zoppi A, Fogari R
Subcutaneous tissue pressure as a method to evaluate the oedematiginos potential of amlodipine versus verapamil
11th Scientific Meeting, American Society of Hypertension
Am J Hypert (Apr) 9:144A 1996

The subjects studied were 35 hypertensive patients who had PSTP performed at baseline and then were assigned to either the dihydropyridine amlodipine (10 mg/day, n=17) or verapamil sustained release (240 mg/day, n=18). PSTP was essentially a capillary tube connected to a needle inserted into the pretibial tissue at one end and connected to a water manometer at the other. Amlodipine was noted to induce an increase in PSTP (4.5 cm H2O) as well as ankle circumference (1.6 cm). Similar indices did not change significantly with verapamil.

Comment: The authors suggest that PSTP may be useful to quantitate edema associated with CCBs. However, they also report no correlation between clinically measured edema (ankle circumference) and PSTP raising some question regarding the usefulness of this tool. Perhaps a more distal measurement point (?lateral malleolus) would provide better correlation. (Sri Narsipur, MD, SUNY-HSC at Syracuse, NY)

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11th Scientific Meeting, American Society of Hypertension
H: Drug therapy : Calcium channel blockers