Lack of association between apolipoprotein E polymorphism and acute myocardial infarction in a Pakistani population

The aim of this study was to examine the association of apolipoprotein E(ApoE) polymorphism with acute myocardial infarction (AMI) in a Pakistani population. A cross-sentional study involving 218 AMI patients (166 males and 51 females; age 30-75 years and 171 healthy controls (121 males and 50 females, age 19-76 years) was carried out on a hospital-based Pakistani population. Fasting serum concentrations of total cholesterol, low density lipoprotein (LDL)-cholesterol, high density lipoprotein (HDL)-cholesterol, triglycerides and glucose were determined using kit methods. DNA was extracted and ApoE polymorphism was studied by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) followed by restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP). Apo E3/E3 genotype was the most common genotype in both cases and controls (78% and 74%, respectively), while E2/E3 genotype was the least common one in this cohort (6.5% and 7.97%, respectively). Frequencies of E2, E3 and E4 alleles in AMI patients (0.078, 0.766 and 0.155, respectively) were not significantly different from the frequencies of these alleles in healthy controls (0.11, 0.708, 0.18, respectively; X²=1.95, p value 0.37). Moreover, no association was observed between genotypes - E3/E4, E2/E3, E3/E3 and serum lipids in AMI patients. ApoE polymorphism was not found to be associated with AMI in a hospitalbased population in Karachi.