Association of small dense lowdensity lipoprotein cholesterol in type 2 diabetics with coronary artery disease.

Background: The risk of coronary artery disease (CAD) increases two- to fourfold in diabetes. Small dense low-density lipoprotein (sdLDL) particles have been linked to an increased risk for CAD. In this study, we sought to compare the sdLDL cholesterol (sdLDL-C) level between the healthy control group and diabetics with CAD in the Taiwanese population. Methods: Serum specimens were collected from healthy females and males of various age groups ( n = 294), type 2 diabetics (DM) without complications ( n = 113), and patients having DM with CAD (DM-CAD) (n = 46). The commercial kit was used for the measurement of sdLDL-C level, which employs a simpler method. After heparin-magnesium precipitation of lipoproteins with density Results: The sdLDL-C level was significantly higher in males than in females ( p p p p = 0.001]. Conclusions: Our data suggest that the sdLDL-C level together with the LDL-C level are better risk assessment markers for type 2 diabetics with CAD than the LDL-C level alone.