A study of serum lipoproteins and angiographic evidence of coronary artery disease.

Extensive serum lipid analyses, with specific emphasis on the concentration of serum beta and pre-beta-lipoproteins, were made on 93 patients who had a clinical diagnosis of angina pectoris and were undergoing coronary angiographic studies. Those individuals with abnormal angiographic evidence of obstructive coronary artery disease, including a group with a prior myocardial infarction, have almost uniformly elevated serum beta-lipoprotein levels when related to an arbitrary division based on the mean values for a "normal" adult population at a similar age level. Compared to serum cholesterol and serum triglycerides, the serum lipoprotein concentrations, specifically beta-lipoproteins, appear to be a more useful parameter for predicting the existence of coronary artery disease. Further studies relating clinical risk factors to coronary artery disease might be better approached by using angiography of coronary vessels rather than myocardial infarction or sudden death from coronary artery disease as an endpoint of morbid data.