title: High-sensitivity C-reactive protein and coronary heart disease mortality in patients with type 2 diabetes: a 7-year follow-up study.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To investigate in a follow-up study whether high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP) predicts coronary heart disease (CHD) events in subjects with type 2 diabetes.
  
  
  METHODS
  The original study population consisted of 1,059 patients with type 2 diabetes (age 45-64 years). Mean duration of diabetes was 8 years. CRP values were available from 1,045 subjects, of whom 878 were free of myocardial infarction (MI) at baseline. CHD mortality and the incidence of nonfatal MI were assessed in a 7-year follow-up.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Altogether, 157 patients died from CHD and 254 had a nonfatal or fatal CHD event. Patients with hs-CRP >3 mg/l had a higher risk for CHD death than patients with hs-CRP < or =3 mg/l (19.8 and 12.9%, respectively, P = 0.004). In Cox regression analysis, patients with high hs-CRP had a relative risk of 1.72 for CHD death even after the adjustment for confounding factors (P = 0.002). Among subjects who were free from MI at baseline, those with a high hs-CRP level had relative risks of 1.83 (P = 0.003) and 1.84 (P = 0.004) for CHD death in univariate and multivariate analyses, respectively.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In this large cohort of type 2 diabetic patients, hs-CRP was an independent risk factor for CHD deaths.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, Turku University Central Hospital, P.O. Box 52, FIN-20521 Turku, Finland. minna.soinio@tyks.fi
authors.forename: Minna
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Soinio
authors.forename: Jukka
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Marniemi
authors.forename: Markku
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Laakso
authors.forename: Seppo
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Lehto
authors.forename: Tapani
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Rönnemaa
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D002097:C-Reactive Protein / Q000032:analysis*; D003327:Coronary Disease / Q000209:etiology / Q000401:mortality*; D003924:Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2 / Q000097:blood* / Q000150:complications; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009203:Myocardial Infarction / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D012307:Risk Factors
chemical_list: D002097:C-Reactive Protein