Role of Apolipoprotein Levels in Clinical Practice

Enormous advances have been made in our understanding of the role of apolipoproteins in the transport of plasma lipids. The apolipoproteins are essential for the packaging of lipoproteins in the liver and intestine, for the interconversion of lipoproteins in the circulation, and for their uptake by tissues. In a sense, the apolipoproteins are the "business end" of the lipoproteins. Since the serum lipoproteins undoubtedly play an important role in atherogenesis, it is reasonable to ask whether serum levels of apolipoproteins can be used as predictors of coronary heart disease (CHD) in the same way that serum cholesterol levels are used for this purpose. The two apolipoproteins that have received the most attention are apolipoprotein B and apolipoprotein A-I. Consideration might be given to the potential value of measurement of each.