The purpose of this study was to evaluate the influence of selected polymorphisms in genes coding for tissue plasminogen activator (-7351 C/T polymorphism), urokinase-type plasminogen activator (1788 C/T polymorphism) and plasminogen activator inhibitor 1 (-675 4G/5G and -844 G/A polymorphism) on the susceptibility to AAA.
In contrast, uPA supernatant levels were differentially expressed, with the highest level existing in AAA (9.7 +/- 2.7 ng/ml), followed by occlusive (4.9 +/- 3.5), and the lowest levels in normal aorta (1.2 +/- 0.7; p < 0.05 for normal vs occlusive, p < 0.001 for normal vs AAA, and p < 0.005 for occlusive vs AAA).