Age and cystathionine β-synthase activity in cultured fibroblasts from patients with arterial and venous vascular disease Original Research Article

In order to determine if cystathionine β-synthase (CBS) could separate groups of patients with various vascular disease, CBS activity was studied in cultured human skin fibroblasts from 30 subjects being either controls, atherosclerotic patients or patients having suffered a deep venous thrombosis. We found a tendency to a negative correlation between age and CBS activity in the control group only (r=−0.58, P=0.08), with a tendency to lower CBS activities in the young patients with atherosclerotic (4.9) or venous disease (5.3) compared to the young control group (10.2). This could implicate higher levels of p-homocysteine with increased age as well as in young patients with atherosclerotic or thrombotic disease causing vascular damage. The results are important for the further discussion of the role of homocysteine as a risk factor for developing atherosclerotic and thrombogenic vascular disease and for finding a suitable screening method as prevention is by vitamin supplement only.