Sex Differences in Beat-to-Beat Heart Rate Response to Systolic Pressure Increases

While some studies suggest that heart rate variability (HRV), systolic blood pressure (SBP), and baroreflex sensitivity (BRS) differ between males and females, others offer contradictory findings. The HYPOL database, provided for the ESGCO 2024 conference challenge, includes a balanced cohort of 272 subjects (146 males and 126 females) of the same ethnicity and similar age range. This study investigates sex differences in the average response of beat-to-beat heart rate to spontaneous increases in SBP, using bivariate phase-rectified signal averaging (BPRSA). A linear regression model revealed that the effect of sex on the BPRSA feature was significant (Estimate $={- 0. 0 0 6 2}$, ${\mathrm {p}}=0.0015$), explaining 4.06% of the variance in the BPRSA feature $({\mathrm {p}}=0.0038)$. These results highlight the importance of considering sex as a significant factor in cardiovascular studies, especially in autonomic regulation and its clinical and therapeutic implications. However, much of the variation in BRS remains unexplained by the included predictors like sex, and age.