Cardiometabolic risk factors and venous thrombosis

Abstract

Several studies during the past decade have shown that patients with venous thrombosis have an increased risk of subsequent arterial thrombosis, thus suggesting a link between the two diseases. The aim of this thesis was to investigate the associations of traditional cardiometabolic risk factors with risk of a first and recurrent venous thrombosis. We showed that levels of major lipids, i.e. total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol and triglycerides, were not associated with a first venous thrombosis. In contrast, low levels of apolipoproteins B and A1 were associated with an increased risk of a first event. Regarding recurrence, tests for lipid levels, glucose levels and hematologic variables did not identify patients at an increased risk of recurrent venous thrombosis, and these tests should not be done for this indication nor influence decisions on duration of anticoagulant treatment. In this thesis, we further searched for associations between lipids and hemostatic factors, and found that levels of vitamin K-dependent factors (VKDFs), including factor IX, were associated with triglyceride levels. We hypothesized that this association could be explained by common mechanisms, regulating levels of both VKDFs and triglycerides.