CORINA ŞERBAN*, RODICA MATEESCU**, LAVINIA NOVEANU**, LELIA ŞUSAN***, ALINA PĂCURARI***, A. CARABA***, I. ROMOŞAN***
*Department of Pathophysiology, **Department of Physiology, ***The IVth Medical Clinic, “Victor Babeş” University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Timişoara
Abstract. Recent studies have indicated that lipoprotein(a) [Lp(a)] and fibrinogen are novel risk factors for systemic atherosclerosis. The main objective of this study was to evaluate the level of Lp(a) and fibrinogen in patients with essential hypertension. The study comprised 20 patients with arterial hypertension and dyslipidemia, 20 patients with arterial hypertension without dyslipidemia and 16 age- and sex-matched control subjects. In all patients, the plasma total cholesterol, triglycerides, HDL-cholesterol, LDL-cholesterol, non-HDL-cholesterol, TC/HDL-cholesterol ratio, LDL-cholesterol/HDL-cholesterol ratio, Lp(a) and fibrinogen levels were evaluated. Using B-mode ultrasonography, we evaluated carotid intima-media thickness (IMT). We found significant higher Lp(a) levels in hypertensive patients with or without comparative with the control group. The most elevated concentrations of fibrinogen were found in hypertensive group with dyslipidemia comparative with hypertensive group without dyslipidemia and with the control group. We found a strong positive correlation between Lp(a) and IMT (p < 0.001), and a moderate positive correlation between Lp(a) and fibrinogen (p < 0.001) and between fibrinogen and IMT (p ≤ 0.001). The measurement of IMT could represent a simple and noninvasive method to monitor hypertensive subjects, with higher levels of Lp(a) and fibrinogen, indifferently of the status of traditionally dyslipidemic risk factors.
Key words: hypertension, lipoprotein(a), fibrinogen.