I remember a few years ago a prominent study (I can't remember the source) suggested an elevated CRP had a more profound effect on the development of heart disease than did an elevated LDL.
And now JAMA reports that causal relationship doesn't exist.
9 Outbursts:
Happy,
I think you missed the point of the article. CRP was thought to be a more poerful predictor of risk than LDL cholesterol. It did not necessarily state that it was the cause, but simply a marker for the presumed inflammation that occurs in the arteries of these patients. the more recent study suggests that CRP itself is not the protein causing the problem.
Keith, I do understand. My assumption at present, and you can correct me if I'm wrong is that elevated CRP is likely a result of CAD and not a cause.
That's not what you title or entry suggest.
Keith, the title/question asked if their was a cause/effect relationship between elevated CRP (causing) heart disease.
The answer to the question is no, according to the new JAMA research. Where's the confusion?
If you consider CRP to be a test to indicate a higher likelihood of atherosclerosis/heart disease (not a cause--I'd never heard that proposed before) and look at the title of this little post, yes, it sounds like you don't know wtf you're talking about. I guess if you read the article then the blog post title isn't as crayzee. Definitely could have been worded more clearly though.
Whats CRP???
I think the Women's Health Study (2002?), Heart Protection Study 2(Zocor study), and the latest Jupiter (Crestor) study all address CRP as a factor in heart disease.
Typical Internist...can talk for hours about a worthless test like C-R-P, but can't do C-P-R....
And JAMA's 50% Drug Ads...
Frank
This all started as when some studies suggested CRP is an indicator for high risk. Later researches started asking themselves whether the elevated CRP in CAD was simply indicator or the result of a parallel process. They have found, to nobody's surprise that many genotypes exist for CRP and people with some of these genotypes have higher CRP levels. They then tried to find an association between these variants and the risk of CAD which has failed as in this study and late last year in a similar study published in NEJM http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/abstract/359/18/1897. If they were able to find an association with these genetic variants resulting in higher CRP levels and higher risk of heart disease, drug companies would likely try to develop molecules to suppress overproduction of CRP theorizing that this, in turn, would decrease cardiac risk.
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