Highlights
- •Cardiovascular diseases are the leading cause of death worldwide.
- •Serum albumin has anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, anticoagulant and antiplatelet aggregation activity.
- •Low serum albumin levels are independently linked to the emergence of several cardiovascular diseases.
- •Hypoalbuminemia is a strong, independent prognosticator in many cardiovascular diseases.
- •Convincing evidence is now that low serum albumin plays as a potentially modifiable risk factor in many cardiovascular diseases.
Abstract
Cardiovascular diseases are the leading cause of death worldwide. Endothelial dysfunction,
inflammation and oxidative stress are at the forefront in the onset and development
of atherosclerosis and many cardiovascular diseases. Epidemiological evidence is that
low serum albumin levels are linked to incident ischemic heart disease, heart failure,
atrial fibrillation, stroke and venous thromboembolism, independent of risk factors,
body mass index and inflammation. Hypoalbuminemia has also emerged as an independent
prognosticator in many cardiovascular diseases, such as coronary artery disease, heart
failure, congenital heart disease, infective endocarditis and stroke, even after adjusting
for usual causal factors and prognostic markers. Given physiological properties of
serum albumin that include anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, anticoagulant and antiplatelet
aggregation activity as well as colloid osmotic effect, hypoalbuminemia could act
as an unrecognized modifiable risk factor. The purpose of this review is to provide
an overview of the physiological properties of serum albumin, as well as prevalence,
causes, prognostic value and potential contribution to the disease emergence and progression
of hypoalbuminemia, and the resulting clinical implications.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: April 19, 2018
Accepted:
April 13,
2018
Received in revised form:
March 24,
2018
Received:
March 8,
2018
Identification
Copyright
© 2018 European Federation of Internal Medicine. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
