Novel Cardiovascular Biomarkers in Patients With Kidney Disease

Currently, there is no specific approach to stratify CV risk in HD patients; therefore, patients are not offered targeted preventative interventions. This novel project will characterise circulating biomarkers and proteomics of myocyte damage, cardiac stress, fibrosis, and inflammation, including lipid composition. Understanding the cardiac biomarkers, targeted proteomics and lipidomics in HD patients as early predictors of CV outcomes will help better decisions on treatment choices and earlier interventions to improve outcomes in these patients. Proteomics and lipidomics, analysed with machine learning techniques, may offer new opportunities to improve risk stratification in these patients. The successful introduction of novel agents, comprising proprotein convertase subtilisin-like/kexin type 9 inhibitors, low-dose oral anticoagulants, sodium-glucose cotransporter 2 inhibitors, glucagon-like peptide-1 agonists, anti-inflammatory agents, and icosapent ethyl, offers an opportunity to reduce the burden of recurrent CV risk further based on their risk stratification. This study aims to obtain pilot data for promising cardiac biomarkers, proteomics and lipidomics, validating them against control groups and establishing prospective changes of the new markers and their relation to the major adverse cardiac events (MACE). Study Objectives 1. To determine circulating plasma levels of new cardiac biomarkers (cMyC, galectin 3) in incident HD patients by comparing them to control groups (PD and CKD 3-4 (not on dialysis)) and to correlate with traditional biomarkers (hsTnT). 2. To evaluate the lipidome as a marker of CVD risk in incident HD patients by studying the indices of HDL quality and quantity, including HDL-particle number, HDL cholesterol, apolipoprotein (apo) A-I levels, serum amyloid A (SAA) content and HDL-cholesterol efflux capacity, and paraoxonase activity of apoB-depleted serum. 3. To evaluate proteomic signature as a marker of cardiac disease risk in incident HD patients by studying the proteomic platform of untargeted high-value proteins for CVD risk (as an exploratory analysis). 4. To explore the association between proposed cardiac biomarkers, proteomics, lipidome and MACE (as an exploratory analysis).