Relation of Lipoprotein(a) in 11- to 19-Year-Old Adolescents to Parental Cardiovascular Heart Disease

We studied several risk factors in relation to parental cardiovascular heart disease: total cholesterol, triglycer-ides, high-density lipoprotein(HDL) cholesterol, low-den-sity lipoprotein(LDL) cholesterol,apolipoprotein(apo) A-I, apo B, and lipoprotein(a) [Lp(a)] were determined in 322 serum samples (43 from subjects with and 279 without parental cardiovascular heart disease). The distributionof Lp(a) concentrations in our young population was similar to that of other white populations, i.e., markedly skewed, with higher frequencies at low values. As compared with children whose parents did not report cardiovascular heart disease, those with affected parents had a higher mean Lp(a) (0.23 vs 0.18 g/L; P <0.05). Moreover, 42% of the childrenwith parental cardiovascularheart disease, but only 19 % of those with no parental cardiovascula