The association of HDL-apoCIII with coronary heart disease and the effect of statin treatment on it

Background Apolipoprotein CIII (apoCIII) is considered to impair the anti-atherogenic effect of high density lipoprotein (HDL) in coronary heart disease (CHD) patients, and apoCIII content in HDL (HDL-apoCIII) predicts CHD more accurately. However, the relationship between HDL-apoCIII and CHD, and the effect of statin treatment on HDL-apoCIII are still unclear. The aims of the study are to establish the association of HDL-apoCIII with CHD, and investigate the effect of statin treatment on HDL-apoCIII in CHD patients. Methods We conducted a hospital-based observational study. Totally 80 non-CHD patients and 120 CHD patients without statin treatment were previously enrolled in this study. All the CHD patients received statin treatment, and 63 of them were followed after 3 months of regular statin treatment. HDL sample of each patient was isolated by density gradient ultracentrifugation from fasting venous plasma, and HDL-apoCIII of each patient was measured by ELISA method. Results HDL-apoCIII was significantly higher in CHD patients than non-CHD patients (p 0.05). Conclusions HDL-apoCIII has a significant and positive association with CHD. Although conventional atherogenic lipid markers have a significantly decrease in CHD patients after statin treatment, HDL-apoCIII has a further elevation at the same time. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12944-015-0129-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.