Study of the characteristic and the related risk factors of coronary artery changes in elderly patients of coronary heart disease complicated with diabetes mellitus

Objective To study the characteristics and the related risk factors of coronary artery changes in the elderly patients of coronary heart disease complicated with diabetes mellitus. Methods According to WHO diagnostic standards of diabetes, coronary heart disease(CHD) complicated with diabetes mellitus(65 patients) was indicated as CHD+DM group, and the coronary heart disease without diabetes(68 patients) was indicated as CHD group. All patients were examined by coronary angiographic semiquantitative(CAG), and blood pressure, oral glucose tolerance test, level of blood sugar, insulin, lipid, BUN and Cr were measured. The coronary artery changes were analysed by CAG, and the severity of coronary artery stenosis were evaluated by AHA standards. The related risk factors in coronary artery disease were analysed by pluralism straight line statistics. Results The coronary multivessel changes(75 4% vs 38 2%, P 0 05), the severity of coronary artery stenosis(8 6±3 8 vs 6 5±3 9, P 0 05) and the calcification (6 6±6 1 vs 3 9±4 1, P 0 05) were significantly increased in CHD+DM group than in CHD group. Distal coronary changes were more frequently seen in the CHD+DM group than in CHD group. The atherosclerotic changes of the coronary artery was significantly correlated with the level of serum lipid and insulin and blood pressure. Conclusions The occurrence of coronary multivessel changes and distal coronary changes were more frequent in the CHD+DM group than in the CHD group, and most of them showed coronary artery diffusing stenosis. These results suggest that diabetes mellitus, hyperlipemia and hypertension are all independent risk factors for the occurrence of coronary artery disease.