Background: It remains uncertain whether activation of the complement system, assessed by the soluble terminal C5b-9 complement complex (plasma TCC), is associated with future risk of incident venous thromboembolism (VTE).
Objectives: To investigate the association between plasma levels of TCC and future risk of incident VTE in a nested case-control study, and to explore genetic variants associated with TCC using protein quantitative trait loci analysis of exome sequencing data.
Methods: We sampled 415 VTE cases and 848 age- and sex-matched controls from a population-based cohort, the Tromsø study. Logistic regression models were used to calculate odds ratios with 95% confidence intervals for VTE across quartiles of plasma levels of TCC. Whole exome sequencing was conducted using the Agilent SureSelect 50 Mb capture kit.
Results: The risk of VTE increased across increasing quartiles of plasma TCC, particularly for unprovoked VTE. Participants with TCC in the highest quartile (>1.40 complement arbitrary units/mL) had an odds ratio for unprovoked VTE of 1.74 (95% confidence interval: 1.10-2.78) compared with those with TCC in the lowest quartile (≤0.80 complement arbitrary units/mL) in analyses adjusted for age, sex, and body mass index. A substantially higher risk for VTE was observed in samples taken shortly before VTE event. We found no association between genome-wide or complement-related gene variants and plasma levels of TCC.
Conclusions: We found that high levels of plasma TCC were associated with VTE risk, and unprovoked events in particular. There was no genome-wide association between gene variants and plasma levels of TCC.
Keywords: complement system; protein quantitative trait loci analysis; terminal complement complex; venous thromboembolism; whole exome sequencing.
© 2019 International Society on Thrombosis and Haemostasis.