Inflammatory activity increases with haemoglobin A1c in patients with acute coronary syndrome

Objective. To study the relationship between inflammation, diabetes and HbA(1)c levels in patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS). Design. Single-centre cross-sectional study comprising 688 consecutive patients with ACS (108 with diabetes) and 341 with stable coronary artery disease (SCAD) (51 with diabetes). High-sensitive C-reactive protein (hsCRP), albumin and fibrinogen concentrations, erythrocyte sedimentation rates (ESR) and leukocyte counts were measured. Results. hsCRP, fibrinogen and ESR levels were higher and albumin lower in ACS patients. ESR was higher, albumin lower and hsCRP borderline significantly higher (p = 0.053) in ACS patient with diabetes compared to those without. All inflammatory markers were associated with HbA(1)c in all 688 ACS patients as well as in 540 non-diabetic ACS patients with normal HbA(1)c. In multivariate analyses, all inflammatory markers were independently associated with HbA(1)c in the entire ACS group, regardless of diabetes being present or not. When non-diabetic ACS patients were analyzed separately, only ESR and leukocyte counts were independently correlated with HbA(1)c. Conclusions. Patients with ACS had increased inflammatory activity, which increased with HbA(1)c levels in patients who neither had a history of diabetes nor HbA1c above normal, and was further exaggerated in the presence of diabetes.