Risk of coronary artery stenosis in Iranian type 2 diabetics: is there a role for matrix metalloproteinase-3 gene (-1612 5A/6A) polymorphism?

To investigate the association of matrix metalloproteinase-3 (MMP-3) polymorphism with susceptibility to coronary artery stenosis (CAS) and the number of diseased vessels in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). The study population comprised 618 unrelated Iranian individual subjects, including 305 angiographically documented CAS patients with T2DM and 313 control subjects with T2DM. MMP3 genotypes were determined by polymerase chain reaction and restriction fragment length polymorphism. Significant differences between cases and controls were observed for MMP3 genotype frequencies (p<0.01). The 6A allele was high frequently seen in the disease group, compared with the control group (64.75 vs. 56.24%, 6A/6A + 5A/6A vs. 5A/5A, p<0.05). The association of this polymorphism with the severity of stenosis were also evaluated which according to results distribution of MMP3 genotypes were not significantly different as compared with the severity of stenosis (p>0.05). Frequency of the 6A allele of the human MMP3 gene is an independent risk factor for CAS in the Iranian T2DM studied.