Preoperative triglycerides predict post-coronary artery bypass graft survival in diabetic patients - A sex analysis

OBJECTIVE - Hypertriglyceridemia is commonly observed in association with d iabetes. Despite cross-sectional studies and isolated longitudinal analyses in patients without coronary artery disease, the suggestion that triglycer ide levels are relevant to subsequent cardiovascular events in the setting of diabetes remains controversial. This study evaluates the predictive valu e of serum triglyceride levels on mortality in post-coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) diabetic patients with subsequent analysis by sex. RESEARCH DESIGN END METHODS - This longitudinal observational study involvi ng a large metropolitan hospital consists of 1,172 diabetic post-CABG patie nts (792 men and 380 women) with lipid data collected between the years 198 2 and 1992. Cox proportional hazards regression models were used to estimat e the risk of mortality and cardiac events associated with triglyceride lev els in the highest quartile (>2.90 mmol/l for men and >3.12 mmol/l for wome n). RESULTS - Elevated preoperative serum triglyceride Values in post-CABG subj ects with diabetes were correlated with increased overall mortality (hazard ratio [HR] 1.26, 95% CI 1.00-1.59). The greatest influence of triglyceride levels was observed on overall (1.89, 1.30-2.73) and event-free survival ( 1.49, 1.06-2.08) in women. High triglyceride values were also modestly rela ted to risk of cardiac events in diabetic men (1.28, 0.99-1.66). CONCLUSIONS - These data suggest that increased preoperative triglyceride l evels predict increased late mortality and cardiac event risk in diabetic p ost-CABG patients, more strongly in women than in men.