Received on December 3, 2007
Accepted on February 26, 2008

Lipids, Lipoproteins, and Cardiovascular Risk Factors

Joint Effects of Antibody to Heat Shock Protein 60, Hypertension, and Diabetes on Risk of Coronary Heart Disease in Chinese

¹ Institute of Occupational Medicine and the Ministry of Education Key Lab of Environment and Health, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
² Department of Cardiology, Union Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
³ Department of Cardiology, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
⁴ Department of Nutrition and Epidemiology, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: Frank.hu{at}channing.harvard.edu.

BACKGROUND: Several studies have suggested an association between antibody to human heat shock protein 60 (anti-Hsp60) and coronary atherosclerosis, but the results have been inconsistent. The aim of this study was to investigate the association between anti-Hsp60 and coronary heart disease (CHD) and to determine whether anti-Hsp60, hypertension, and diabetes have joint effects on CHD risk.

METHODS: We measured the concentrations of anti-Hsp60 in 1003 CHD patients and 1003 age- and sex-matched control subjects without CHD events.

RESULTS: Concentrations of anti-Hsp60 were significantly higher in CHD patients than in controls. Increasing concentrations of anti-Hsp60 were significantly associated with higher risk of CHD (P for trend <0.0001) and with increasing severity of CHD as assessed by number of diseased vessels detected with angiography [odds ratio (OR) 3.67, 95% CI 1.56-8.64, P = 0.003] after multivariate adjustment for traditional CHD risk factors. There were strong joint effects of high concentrations of anti-Hsp60 and hypertension (OR 5.17, 95% CI 3.95-6.75, P < 0.0001) and diabetes (OR 6.49, 95% CI 4.52-9.33, P < 0.0001) on CHD risk; simultaneous occurrence of high anti-Hsp60 concentrations, hypertension, and diabetes conferred a dramatically higher risk of CHD (OR 20.99, 95% CI 12.50-35.24, P < 0.0001) in multivariate analyses.

CONCLUSIONS: Anti-Hsp60 is independently associated with CHD risk, and a combination of high anti-Hsp60, hypertension, and diabetes is particularly detrimental for CHD risk.