Introduction: Presently serum ALP activity measurement is used as a marker for bone and liver diseases. In recent research it has been found that the level of ALP activity increases in atherosclerosis and peripheral vascular diseases. Even though at present ALP is not measured for CVD diagnosis but rising evidence showed that increased ALP activity increases CVD risk and its mortality too. At present there are very limited numbers of studies related to ALP activity in CVD. Therefore, we have analyzed serum ALP activity in myocardial infarction, heart failure, rheumatic heart disease, complete heart block, Myocarditis and congenital heart disease patients. Materials and methods: It was a case control study. 229 cases of CVD (Complete Heart Block-16, Congenital Heart Disease-1, Heart Failure-22, Myocardial Infarction-169, Myocarditis-1, Rheumatic Heart Disease-20) who were admitted in Cardiology ward were taken as cases and age and gender matched healthy persons were taken as controls (n=229). Serum ALP activity estimation was done by PNPP kinetic method using the commercially available kit on fully automated chemistry analyzer. Data is presented as median and inter quartile range (IQR). Statistical analysis was done on SPSS 16.0 and Microsoft Excel. Difference in the level of ALP across the Diagnostic Categories was calculated by Kruskal-Wallis test. P-value <0.05 was taken as significant. Results: The Median (IQR) ALP level was significantly higher in cases (ALP=210 (95) IU/L) as compared to controls (ALP=187 (23) IU/L) (<0.0005). There was no statistically significant difference in the ALP levels across the diagnostic categories. Conclusion: Serum ALP activity is significantly increased in different cardiac diseases, which can be considered as a marker in the panel along with other markers for CVD patients. Further research is needed with specific isoenzyme study of ALP in large cohorts and diverse ethnic population, so that can be considered in a panel of marker for cardiovascular risk.
