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Implication of lipocalin-2 and visfatin levels in patients with coronary heart disease

¹ Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism, Department of Internal Medicine² Division of Biostatistics, Graduate School of Public Health and ³ Division of Cardiology, Department of Internal Medicine, Korea University College of Medicine, Seoul 152-050, South Korea

(Correspondence should be addressed to C G Park who is now at Division of Cardiology, Department of Internal Medicine, Korea University Guro Hospital, 80 Guro-Dong, Guro-Gu, Seoul 152-050, South Korea; Email: medica7{at}hanmail.net)

Objectives: Visfatin and lipocalin-2 are novel adipokines associated with insulin resistance (IR) and obesity-related metabolic disorders. We compared lipocalin-2 and visfatin concentrations between patients with coronary heart disease (CHD) and control subjects and evaluated their association with cardiovascular risk factors.

Methods: We examined serum visfatin, lipocalin-2 levels, and cardiovascular risk factors in 91 subjects (49 patients with angiographically confirmed CHD versus 42 age- and gender-matched control participants).

Results: Circulating lipocalin-2 levels were significantly higher in patients with CHD compared with the control subjects (82.6±38.7 ng/ml versus 43.8±27.8 ng/ml; P<0.001). However, visfatin levels were not significantly different between patients with CHD and control subjects. Serum lipocalin-2 levels were positively associated with weight (r=0.26; P=0.036), fasting insulin (r=0.36; P=0.003), and IR (r=0.33; P=0.007), whereas these levels showed a negative correlation with high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol (r=–0.30; P=0.016) after adjustment for gender and body mass index. However, visfatin levels were not associated with any variables of the metabolic syndrome. The multiple regression analysis showed that lipocalin-2 levels were independently associated with HDL cholesterol and IR (R²=0.199). Furthermore, the multiple logistic regression analysis showed that systolic blood pressure, IR, and lipocalin-2 levels were independently associated with CHD.

Conclusions: Serum lipocalin-2 levels were significantly elevated in patients with CHD and were independently associated with CHD. The present findings suggest that the measurement of serum lipocalin-2 levels may be useful for assessing CHD risk.