Pharmacogenomics and Personalized Medicine (Dec 2021)
Apolipoprotein E Gene Polymorphism and Coronary Artery Disease Risk Among Patients in Northwest China
Abstract
Wenbing Ma,1,2 Xiaodong Ren,1 Liting Zhang,1 Haiyan Dong,1 Xiaoyun Lu,2 Weiyi Feng1 1Department of Pharmacology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, Shaanxi, 710061, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Biological Science and Bioengineering, Key Laboratory of Biomedical Information Engineering of the Ministry of Education, School of Life Science and Technology, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, Shaanxi, 710049, People’s Republic of ChinaCorrespondence: Xiaoyun Lu Tel/Fax +86-29-82668463Email [email protected] Feng Tel/Fax +86-29-85323242Email [email protected]: The association between apolipoprotein E (ApoE) gene polymorphisms and the risk of coronary artery disease (CAD) among different populations has been assessed in numerous previous studies, but the results remain inconclusive. The present study aimed to determine the role of ApoE genotypes in CAD risk and the interrelationships between lipid profiles and ApoE alleles and genotypes among the population of northwest China.Patients and Methods: This study was performed on 308 patients with CAD and 308 control participants. ApoE gene polymorphism was analysed using the polymerase chain reaction and hybridization.Results: The findings indicated that the frequencies of ϵ3/ϵ4 genotype and ϵ4 allele frequency were significantly higher in patients with CAD than in the control participants. ϵ2 carriers had significantly lower total cholesterol (TC), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and triglycerides (TG) levels than did ϵ3 or ϵ4 carriers among the control participants. However, our study found no significant differences in plasma lipoprotein levels between ɛ2, ɛ3 and ɛ4 carriers in patients with CAD. Moreover, ϵ4 carriers had significantly higher ApoB, ApoB/ApoA-I levels and significantly lower ApoE levels in both patients with CAD and control participants. ϵ4 allele presence was associated with a nearly two-fold higher CAD risk. After adjusting for other established risk factors, ϵ4 allele was an independent risk factor for CAD. After stratified by age (≤ 60 years and > 60 years), ϵ4 allele was indicated to increase the CAD risk 3.3-fold in elderly patients with CAD, but not in young patients with CAD. After stratified by sex, ϵ4 allele was not a risk factor in females and males patients with CAD.Conclusion: This study provides evidence that the ϵ4 allele, drinking, smoking, hypertension, and TG and ApoE levels are independent risk factor for CAD among patients in northwest China.Keywords: apolipoprotein E, coronary artery disease, gene polymorphism, Northwest China
