ABSTRACT
Prevalence of coronary artery disease (CAD) in Indian population is gradually increasing at an alarming rate. Traditional risk factors fail to explain the high incidence of CAD. Although lipoprotein(a) has been shown to be a risk factor for atherosclerosis, there is very limited data regarding Indian patients. The present study was therefore undertaken to assess the role of lipoprotein(a) levels as a risk factor in CAD in Indian patients. Clinical profile, lipid profile, coronary angiography and lipoprotein(a) levels were assessed in 300 patients with CAD and 200 controls with no CAD. There was no significant difference in age, conventional risk factors like diabetes, hypertension, smoking, family history and lipid parameters between the two groups. The mean plasma lipoprotein(a) levels in patients with CAD was 32.18 +/- 1.37 mg/dl. The value was not significantly higher than that of the mean of 29.94 +/- 2.59 mg/dl of lipoprotein(a) in the control group. In the subgroup of diabetics and patients with myocardial infarction there was a trend towards increased lipoprotein(a) levels compared to controls but the difference was not statistically significant. Nor there was any relationship between lipoprotein(a) levels and number of stenosed coronary arteries. Thus the study shows that lipoprotein(a) levels do not significantly correlate with the presence of coronary artery disease.
Subject(s)
Case-Control Studies , Chi-Square Distribution , Coronary Angiography , Coronary Disease/blood , Female , Humans , Incidence , India/epidemiology , Lipids/blood , Lipoprotein(a)/blood , Male , Middle Aged , Prevalence , Risk FactorsABSTRACT
This study included 48 patients with chronic rheumatic heart disease, 60 control subjects for plasma zinc comparison and 20 control specimens of heart valves from postmortem cases of accident deaths. Plasma and cardiac tissue levels of zinc in patients with rheumatic heart disease were significantly lowered compared to controls. Since zinc is important in the synthesis of nucleic acids and proteins it may influence tissue growth, reparative process and structure and function of biomembrane. Low zinc levels may also influence cell mediated immunity and may increase susceptibility of patients to infection and increased rheumatic activity which needs further study.