Evaluation of Serum Levels of LP-PLA2 and CA-242 in Adult Male Cigarette Smokers in Nnewi Metropolis

Background: Cigarette smoking is a behavioural lifestyle in which a substance is burned and the resulting smoke breathed into the body system. Thus, cigarette smoking is a known public health challenge given the number of tobacco-related diseases like hypertension, lung cancer, cardiovascular diseases (CVD) etc. leading to increased mortality in developed and developing countries. Notwithstanding that the effects of smoking are well documented, individuals who practice cigarette smoking are still on the increase most especially in the developing countries. Study Design/Aim: This was a cross-sectional study designed to evaluate the serum levels of Cancer Antigen-242 (CA-242) and Lipoprotein-Associated Phospholipase A2 (Lp-PLA2) in adult male smokers in Nnewi Metropolis, as emerging inflammatory biomarkers. Materials and methods: A total of 135 subjects aged between 16-65 years were selected for this study. They were classified into 2 major groups (test and control); comprising of 85 cigarette smokers (55 and 30 as test subjects for the evaluation of CA-242 and Lp-PLA2) respectively and 50 non-cigarette smokers (35 and 15 as control subjects for CA-242 and Lp-PLA2 evaluations) respectively. A well-structured questionnaire was used for the collation of information from the participants. Results: the mean serum level of Lp-PLA2 was significantly elevated (P<0.05) in cigarette smokers (67.52±27.29) compared with the non-smokers (63.63±20.81). While the serum level of CA-242 among smokers (1.77±0.70) was of no significant difference (P=0.711) when compared with the non-smokers (1.81±0.20). More so, the mean serum levels of Lp-PLA2 correlated positively with the duration of smoking (r=0.297) and age (r=0.085) in male cigarette smokers. However, there were negative relationships when CA-242 were correlated with duration of smoking (r = -0.156) and age of smokers (r=-0.155). Conclusion: The increased level of Lp-PLA2 along with its positive correlation with other traditional markers like age and smoking duration suggests that Lp-PLA2 is a suitable biomarker to predict cardiac related diseases among cigarette smokers. This is because, Lp-PLA2 is a more specific cardiac predictor compared to the non-specific conventional biomarkers. We therefore suggest that Lp-PLA2 as an independent advanced predictor of cardiovascular disease be further evaluated using follow-up studies with better sample size in CVDs related cases