Background
Chronic pressure overload (such as arterial hypertension) may cause left ventricular (LV) remodeling, alterations in cardiac function, and the development of diastolic heart failure. Changes in the composition of the myocardial extracellular matrix (ECM) may contribute to the development of pressure-overload (PO) induced LV remodeling. We hypothesized that a specific pattern of plasma biomarker expression that reflected changes in these pathophysiologic mechanisms would have diagnostic application to identify: 1-patients who have developed LV hypertrophy and 2-patients with LV hypertrophy who have developed diastolic heart failure.
Methods and Results
Plasma concentration of 17 biomarkers (MMP-1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 9, TIMP-1, 2, 3, 4, NT-proBNP, cardiotrophin, osteopontin, sRAGE, CITP, PINP, PIIINP), an echocardiogram, and 6-minute hall walk were performed on 241 referent control subjects, 144 patients with LV hypertrophy (LVH) but no evidence of heart failure, and 61 patients with LV hypertrophy and diastolic heart failure (DHF). A plasma multi-biomarker panel consisting of increased MMP-7, MMP-9, TIMP-1, PIIINP, and NT-proBNP predicted the presence of LVH with an AUC of 0.80. A plasma multi-biomarker panel consisting of increased MMP-2, TIMP-4, PIIINP and decreased MMP-8 predicted the presence of DHF with an AUC of 0.79. These multi-biomarkers panels performed better than any single biomarker including NT-proBNP, and better than using clinical co-variates alone (AUC = 0.73 for LVH, 0.68 for DHF).
Conclusions
Plasma biomarkers reflecting changes in ECM fibrillar collagen homeostasis, combined into a multi-biomarker panel, have discriminative value in identifying the presence of structural remodeling (LVH) and clinical disease (DHF).