Cerebrovascular disease and Lp(a): its role in atherosclerotic plaque formation and vessel wall elasticity of the carotid arteries.

Lp(a) was found to represent an independent risk factor of extracranial carotid atherosclerosis (CA). Here we report on an investigation with 808 subjects randomly selected from stroke patients as well as from asymptomatic subjects. Serum levels of Lp(a), total cholesterol (TC), HDL-C and the ratios of TC/HDL-C and LDL-C/HDL-C correlated highly significantly with the carotid score using a univariate test. Performing a discriminant analysis, the following ranking was obtained: Lp(a), HDL-C, LDL-C/HDL-C. Evaluation of the vessel wall elasticity in 746 subjects revealed Lp(a) to be the only highly significant parameter. Thus, Lp(a) has to be taken into consideration when establishing a risk profile of CA.