Mathilde MURA, PhD Sciences et Techniques des Activités Physiques et Sportives (STAPS), LIBM, Université Lyon 1
Effect of an individualised home-based physical intervention on carotid atherosclerotic plaque instability in non-endarterectimised patients
Atherosclerosis is an inflammatory multifactorial disease characterized by the presence of atherosclerotic plaques at the bifurcation of large arteries. In carotid plaques, intraplaque haemorrhage (IPH) and intercurrent inflammatory processes cause plaque instability potentially leading to ischemic stroke. Benefits of the endarterectomy surgery (to remove the plaque) remains controversial in patients with asymptomatic plaques (no history of ischemic stroke). Moreover, in two previous cross-sectional prospective studies, our team demonstrated that patients practicing moderate physical activity (PA) had lower rates of IPH and pro-inflammatory monocytes. Thus, we hypothesized that an individualized home-based PA intervention can reduce IPH and modulate inflammation, as well as monocyte phenotype in asymptomatic patients with a non-endarterectomized carotid atherosclerotic plaque. We did a randomised controlled trial to test the influence of a home-based PA intervention on carotid plaque instability features, including IPH and monocyte phenotype.