Distribution of electrophoretically separated serum high density lipoprotein subfraction levels among healthy students and its alteration in patients with liver diseases.

In an attempt to evaluate high density lipoprotein (HDL) subfraction levels in liver diseases, HDL was separated by a precipitation method with dextran sulfate-Mg2+ from sera of 289 healthy adults and 50 patients with liver diseases. The HDL was subdivided into HDL2e and HDL3e by Utermann's polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis with lauric acid. Ultracentrifugally separated HDL2 and HDL3 roughly corresponded to HDL2e and HDL3e, respectively. Male and female groups had different distributions of HDL2e/HDL3e ratios. Among healthy males, 121 cases had ratios less than 1.0 (mean +/- SD = 0.72 +/- 0.39, n = 150), while among healthy females, the ratios were generally larger than those of males and varied widely from 0.2 to 6.6 (mean +/- SD = 1.77 +/- 1.05, n = 139). Low levels of HDL-cholesterol were found in patients with liver diseases, except those with mild alcoholic liver injury and intrahepatic cholestasis. Apparent decreases in HDL3e, but not in HDL2e, were found in all cases with liver diseases investigated, even in those who did not show decreases in the total HDL level, when male and female patients were analyzed separately. The analysis of HDL subfractions by the present method is simple and useful for the study on altered lipid metabolism in liver diseases.