Aldosterone modulates blood homocysteine and cholesterol in coronary artery disease patients – a possible impact on atherothrombosis?

摘要

Aldosterone plays a key role in maintaining the homeostasis ofthe whole organism. Under some circumstances, aldosterone cancontribute to the progression of cardiovascular diseases,including coronary artery disease. This study demonstrates thataldosterone associates negatively with some lipidogramparameters and positively with the concentration ofhomocysteine. These associations are characteristic for coronaryartery disease and are not present in control subjects. Thefindings also indicate that in vitro aldosterone stimulateshomocysteine production by rat adrenal glands, which mayexplain the associations observed with coronary artery disease.Moreover, we have found that aldosterone significantlymodulates in vitro platelet reactivity to arachidonate and collagen– aldosterone increases the pro-aggregatory action of collagen,but decreases the pro-aggregatory potential of arachidonate.Therefore, the findings of these in vitro and ex vivo experimentsindicate the existence of new pathways by which aldosteronemodulates lipid- homocysteine- and platelet-dependentatherogenesis.