Lipid screening in a volunteer population in Singapore

Coronary risk profile screening was performed in 1065 volunteers during the National Heart Week 1988 as part of the National Heart Association's campaign against the increasing incidence of ischaemic heart disease. Of particular importance was the use of a desktop analyser for lipid screening of total cholesterol and high density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol. It was found that the mean serum cholesterol was 211 +/- 39.5 mg/dl, with 62% of the participants having a total cholesterol greater than 200 mg/dl and 23.1% having a total cholesterol greater than 240 mg/dl. For HDL cholesterol, the mean was 48.4 +/- 17 mg/dl, with 18.7% of the participants having a low HDL cholesterol of less than 35 mg/dl. The male Indians had a significantly lower HDL cholesterol compared to male Malays. Three or more risk factors for coronary artery disease was present in 21.7% of Chinese, 41.2% of Malays and 50% of Indians. We conclude therefore that a proportion of this volunteer population, the majority of which have no overt heart disease, is at risk from coronary artery disease from an elevated cholesterol or low HDL cholesterol level. A follow-up of 90 participants who were initially detected to have an elevated cholesterol in 1986, however, showed that only 54.4% still had an elevated cholesterol of greater than 240 mg/dl, thus suggesting that early detection may help to reduce this risk.