Antiplatelet response to clopidogrel is associated with a haplotype in CYP2C19 gene in Pakistani patients

Clopidogrel, an antiplatelet drug, is frequently prescribed to patients diagnosed with ischemic diseases such as those suffering from acute coronary syndromes or ischemic stroke. Despite the drug being effective in majority of the patients, some still experience ischemic events early in the treatment which might be due to poor platelet inhibition. This study aims to investigate the association of cytochrome P450 2C19 (CYP2C19) loss-of-function polymorphisms, haplotypes as well as a wide range of clinical and demographic variables with platelet aggregation phenotypes to clopidogrel in a Pakistani cohort. The study comprised of a total of 120 patients diagnosed with cardiovascular diseases and were treated with clopidogrel. Antiplatelet response to clopidogrel was monitored by Helena AggRAM (HL-2-1785P) and patients with maximal platelet aggregation more than 50% were categorized as low responders and those with less than 50% as high responders. Our results show that 56.6% of patients were homozygous for the CYP2C19 wild-type allele, 38.3% of patients possessed one copy of the CYP2C19*2 allele and 5% of patients possessed both CYP2C19*2 alleles. No CYP2C19*3 allele was found in our patient cohort. There was no statistically significant difference between the high and low responder groups to clopidogrel in terms of extensive, intermediate and poor metabolizer genotypes. However, haplotype (H1), leukocyte count, random blood glucose, and history of diabetes mellitus was associated with the antiplatelet response to clopidogrel. The prevalence of clopidogrel resistance in our population was in line with that reported for other regional and global populations.