Usefulness of genome-wide association studies to identify novel genetic variants underlying the plasma lipoprotein metabolism as risk factors for CAD

Abstract

Coronary artery disease (CAD) is a major killer across the world. The pathogenesis of CAD is a construct of multiple predisposing elements, including environmental, health and genetic factors. Traditional risk factors for CAD include age, hypertension, diabetes, smoking, and dyslipidaemia. Optimizing the lipid levels to within the normal range significantly and drastically reduces the risk of coronary atherosclerosis. Genome-wide association studies (GWASs) promise to accurately identifying the variants that increase or decrease the risks of multiple and complex disorders. In this review, we shed light on and discuss the recent GWASs of lipoprotein genetics and how such studies have provided new pathways and pharmacological targets that might enable the control the pathological plasma cholesterol levels.

The 9p21.3 risk locus for coronary artery disease: A 10-year search for its mechanism

“…These factors act independently or in concert with each other to increase the risk of CAD. Controlling for the known risk factors of CAD, such as smoking, randomized clinical trials have shown that hypercholesterolaemia 2 is associated with an approximately 30–40% reduction in clinical events, such as myocardial infarction and subsequent death 3 . The other 40–60% of the risk of CAD is heritable according to epidemiological, twin and family studies.…”