Oxidative stress evaluated using an automated method for hydroperoxide estimation in patients with coronary artery disease.

BACKGROUND

Reactive oxygen species (ROS) play a major role in the pathogenesis of different chronic and degenerative diseases, including atherosclerosis. However, the lack of feasible and reliable methods limits the spread of oxidative stress estimation for routine application in clinical chemistry laboratories. We have recently evaluated the analytical characteristics of an automated test for the measurement of hydroperoxides (HPs) and its performance in determining oxidative stress levels in a general population. In this study we applied this method for the evaluation of oxidative stress in a cohort of patients with coronary artery disease (CAD).

METHODS

A total of 69 patients with angiographically verified CAD and 34 age- and sex-matched control subjects were enrolled in the study.

RESULTS

HPs were higher in patients with CAD (p<0.01), significantly increasing with disease severity (p<0.01). HPs were also higher in subjects with diabetes, dyslipidemia or C-reactive protein >1.5mg/L. A significant positive correlation was observed between glucose and HP levels. In a multivariate model, diabetes (odds ratio OR=3.5, 95% CI 1.2-10, p<0.05) and CAD (OR=5.7, CI 1.1-28.5, p<0.05) were independent determinants for the 75th HP percentile.

CONCLUSIONS

The results obtained with this method largely reproduce those found using other oxidative stress biomarkers, but the method is faster, easy to perform and does not require skilled operators or complex instrumentation, and thus is a reliable procedure that might represent a feasible tool for oxidative stress estimation in the cardiovascular setting.