Galectin-3 is associated with coronary plaque burden and obstructive sleep apnoea syndrome severity

Abstract

A b s t r a c tBackground: Obstructive sleep apnoea syndrome (OSAS) is reported to be associated with hypertension, coronary artery disease, atrial fibrillation, and heart failure. Galectin-3 plays an important role in the regulation of inflammation, development of cardiac fibrosis, and remodelling. A significant relationship between galectin-3 and the total number of coronary plaques and the macrocalcified plaque structures of patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus has been reported. Aim:The aim of this study was to investigate the association between galectin-3 level and coronary plaque burden as well as OSAS severity in patients with OSAS.Methods: A total of 87 consecutive patients with a diagnosis of OSAS and 21 age-and gender-matched control subjects were recruited for the present study. The patients with OSAS were also categorised according to their apnoea hypopnoea index (AHI) as follows: mild (AHI = 5-15), moderate (AHI = 15-30), and severe (AHI > 30). All study subjects underwent coronary computed tomography angiography to detect coronary atherosclerosis. Also, all participants of serum galectin-3 concentrations were measured.Results: Mean galectin-3 level was significantly higher in patients with OSAS compared to control subjects (p < 0.001) and in the severe OSAS group, compared to the moderate and mild OSAS groups (p < 0.001). Correlation analysis indicated significant positive relationships between galectin-3 concentrations and the total number of coronary plaques (p < 0.001), high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (p = 0.001), and severity of OSAS (p < 0.001). In multivariate analysis, galectin-3 (p = 0.01) and age (p = 0.025) were significant independent predictors of coronary atherosclerosis, after adjusting for other risk factors. Also, it has been found that galectin-3 concentration is a predictor of OSAS severity (p = 0.001).Conclusions: Galectin-3 is associated with coronary atherosclerosis and OSAS severity in OSAS patients.

Comprehensive coronary plaque assessment in patients with obstructive sleep apnea

“…Our results suggest a significant burden of non-calcified plaques in OSA. This is in line with some previous studies (Murphy et al, 2017;Sharma et al, 2012); however, other investigations showed no difference in non-calcified plaques in OSA (Kent et al, 2013;Pusuroglu et al, 2017). We found only a trend for higher CAC values in OSA.…”

“…Segment stenosis score was significantly higher in obstructive sleep apnea (p < 0.01) F I G U R E 3 Comparison of coronary artery calcium scores. Coronary artery calcium score tended to be higher in obstructive sleep apnea (p = 0.07) criteria for OSA, ranging from AHI score of 5/hr (Matthews et al, 2011;Medeiros et al, 2017;Nakanishi-Minami et al, 2012;Sorajja et al, 2008;Weinreich et al, 2013) to 10/hr (Sharma et al, 2012), in addition to the combination of objective measures and symptoms (Pusuroglu et al, 2017). We hypothesised that even mild OSA may be associated with CAD (Hu et al, 1999); therefore, we chose AHI score of 5/hr as a diagnostic threshold without taking into account symptoms or comorbidities.…”

“…Differences in diagnostic methods may lead to underdiagnosis or underestimation of severity in some patients. Moreover, studies also varied in diagnostic criteria for OSA, ranging from AHI score of 5/hr (Matthews et al., ; Medeiros et al., ; Nakanishi‐Minami et al., ; Sorajja et al., ; Weinreich et al., ) to 10/hr (Sharma et al., ), in addition to the combination of objective measures and symptoms (Pusuroglu et al., ). We hypothesised that even mild OSA may be associated with CAD (Hu et al., ); therefore, we chose AHI score of 5/hr as a diagnostic threshold without taking into account symptoms or comorbidities.…”

“…only one utilised a 256-slice instrument (Pusuroglu et al, 2017). One of the strengths of our study is that we used a 256-slice device and accordingly plaques could be assessed with a higher level of accuracy.…”

“…Several studies have investigated CAD in OSA using computed tomography (Arik et al, 2013;Kent et al, 2013;Kim et al, 2010;Kwon et al, 2014;Lutsey et al, 2015;Luyster, Kip, Aiyer, Reis, & Strollo, 2014;Matthews et al, 2011;Medeiros et al, 2017;Murphy et al, 2017;Nakanishi-Minami et al, 2012;Pusuroglu et al, 2017;Seo et al, 2017;Sharma et al, 2012;Sorajja et al, 2008;Weinreich et al, 2013). However, there were considerable differences in the studied populations and diagnostic tests.…”