ORIGINAL ARTICLE Oxidative stress markers in coronary artery disease patients with diabetes mellitus Kishore Kumar Gundapaneni 1 & Rajesh Kumar Galimudi 1 & Mrudula Spurthi Kondapalli 1 & Srilatha Reddy Gantala 1 & Saraswati Mudigonda 1 & Chiranjeevi Padala 1 & Nivas Shyamala 1 & Sanjib Kumar Sahu 2 & Surekha Rani Hanumanth 1 Received: 23 February 2016 /Accepted: 14 June 2016 # Research Society for Study of Diabetes in India 2016 Abstract Coronary artery disease (CAD) is the major cause of morbidity and mortality. Diabetes is one of the powerful and independent risk factor for CAD. Hyperglycemia and hy- percholesterolemia initiate the oxidative stress and complica- tions like atherosclerosis which induces poor prognosis in diabetic CAD patients. The aim of the present study was to assess oxidative stress by comparing the levels of malondialdehyde and comet tail length in diabetic CAD pa- tients, non-diabetic CAD patients and healthy controls. The study included 400 subjects of which 200 were healthy con- trols, 100 were diabetic CAD patients, and 100 were non- diabetic CAD patients. Fasting and postprandial glucose levels, glycosylated hemoglobin, serum lipid levels, malondialdehyde, and DNA damage were estimated in all subjects by using commercially available kits and standard pro- tocols. FBS (185.60 ± 6.0 mg/dL), PPG (250 ± 7.06 mg/dL), HbA1c (10.65 ± 2.01 %), TC (280.72 ± 5.25 mg/dL), TG (195.11 ± 5.99 mg/dL), LDL (163.28 ± 5.68 mg/dL), MDA (9.74 ± 2.33 n moles/mL), and comet tail length (21.60 ± 5.69 μm) were significantly high in diabetic CAD patients (p < 0.05) compared to non-diabetic CAD patients and controls. Fasting and postprandial blood sugar levels sig- nificantly correlated with oxidative stress markers like MDA (r = 0.553, r = 0.557, p < 0.01) and comet tail length (r = 0.489, r = 0.626, p < 0.01) in diabetic CAD patients compared to non- diabetic CAD patients. Our study showed that diabetic CAD patients with increased levels of oxidative stress markers (MDA and DNA damage) might have the poor prognosis than non- diabetic CAD patients. Keywords Coronary artery disease . Diabetes . Oxidative stress . MDA . DNA damage Introduction Coronary artery disease (CAD) is one of the major con- tributor of morbidity and mortality throughout the world [1]. Among classical risk factors, diabetes mellitus is an independent risk factor for the development and progres- sion of the CAD [2]. It has also been found that risk of CAD is twice and also increases the chance of mortality by four times in diabetics compared to non-diabetic pop- ulation [3]. Therefore, there is a compelling need to un- dertake a study to evaluate the effects of hyperglycemia in CAD patients. Hyperlipidemia and hyperglycemia causes the hardening of blood vessels and accelerates the atherosclerotic process and induces poor prognosis in diabetic CAD patients [4, 5]. Oxidative stress occurs due to the imbalance between antiox- idants and reactive oxygen species, induces oxidation of lipids, DNA damage, etc. Malondialdehyde (MDA), a stable end product of lipid peroxidation, stimulates the various physiological conse- quences such as changes in the structural integrity of mem- branes, inactivation of membrane bound enzymes, and surface receptors leading to pathogenesis of disease. Single cell gel electrophoresis (SCGE) or comet assay is a sensitive, simple, inexpensive, and a rapid method used to detect DNA damage of individual cells and reveals the presence of double-strand breaks, single-strand breaks, and * Surekha Rani Hanumanth surekharanih@gmail.com 1 Department of Genetics, Osmania University, Hyderabad, Telangana 500007, India 2 Department of Cardiology, Durgabai Deshmukh Hospital and Research Centre, Vidyanagar, Hyderabad, Telangana, India Int J Diabetes Dev Ctries DOI 10.1007/s13410-016-0515-4