[Total plasma homocysteine concentrations in Puerto Rican patients with ischemic heart disease].
OBJECTIVE
In Puerto Rico, it has been established that although coronary disease is the leading cause of death, the population has a lower incidence of coronary disease than in the continental United States. In addition, the severity of the disease is less aggressive in terms of a lower incidence of ventricular tachycardia and sudden death. One factor that could contribute to the lower incidence of coronary disease in Puerto Rico is that our population might have lower total plasma homocysteine concentrations (tHcys) than in the continental United States. Our main objective was to measure tHCys in the Puerto Rican population with atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ACD).


METHODS
We randomly measured tHcys concentrations in seventy Puerto Rican patients who were hospitalized at the Cardiovascular Center of Puerto Rico and the Caribbean (UPR Division).


RESULTS
The mean tHCys concentration in these patients is similar to those reported for the Framingham study when adjusted by age (11.2 vs. 11.8 micromol/l). In the Puerto Rican population, males had a higher tHcys concentration than females (11.7 vs 9.5 micromol/l, p = 0.07). In addition, we did not see an increase of tHcys concentrations in diabetic patients when compared with non-diabetics (10.1 vs. 11.2 micromol/l, p = 0.74). We did not see a direct correlation between tHcys concentrations and heart condition as measured by coronary angiography (normal = 11.1 micromol/l, light = 10.5 micromol/l, moderate = 10.9 micromol/l, severe = 10.5 micromol/l; Kruskal-Wallis = 0.45) either.


CONCLUSIONS
These results suggest that tHcys concentration is not a good predictor of the seriousness of ACD in the Puerto Rican patient population.
Rodríguez
J F
JF
Departamento de Bioquímica. Unidad de Biología Cardiovascular. Escuela de Medicina. Universidad de Puerto Rico. jrodriguez@rcm.upr.edu
Escobales
N
N
Cruz
D
D
Banch
H
H
Rivera
C
C
Altieri
P I
PI
D005260:Female; D006710:Homocysteine / Q000097:blood*; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D017202:Myocardial Ischemia / Q000097:blood* / Q000453:epidemiology; D011647:Puerto Rico
D006710:Homocysteine