Glu298Asp Endothelial Nitric Oxide Synthase Gene Polymorphism and Coronary Artery Disease in Caucasians, a Meta-Analysis

A number of studies recently reported a positive association between the glu298asp polymorphism in endothelial nitric oxide synthase gene and coronary artery diseases (cad), however, others were unable to replicate these finding. to re-evaluate the association between the glu298asp polymorphism and cad in caucasian population by performing a meta-analysis of all published case-control studies. methods and results: we searched medline and embase for articles about the glu298asp polymorphism and cad, until march 2003. we found 20 studies and included 13 cases-control series from 8 studies in caucasian, contained 7998 patients with cad and 5471 healthy controls. the overall frequencies for tt, gt, and gg genotype were 12.6%, 43.0% 44.4% in cases, and 10.2%, 44.7%, and 45.1% in controls, respectively. the overall distribution of t allele in the case and control subjects was 34.1% and 32.5%. the pooled estimate odds ratio of cad by use of dersimo-nian and laird's random effects model was 1.11 (95% ci: 0.94, 1.30) for tt versus gg, and 1.12 (0.98, 1.28) for tt versus gt and gg combined. conclusions: our finding in a meta-analysis of 13 independent case-control studies, argued against the hypothesis that the enos glu298asp polymorphism is a major risk factor for coronary artery disease in the caucasian population.