Urinary proteomics in cardiovascular disease: Achievements, limits and hopes

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the major cause of mortality and morbidity worldwide. Diagnosis of CVD and risk stratification of patients with CVD remains challenging despite the availability of a wealth of non-invasive and invasive tests. Clinical proteomics analyses a large number of peptides and proteins in biofluids. For clinical applications, the urinary proteome appears particularly attractive due to the relative low complexity compared with the plasma proteome and the noninvasive collection of urine. In this article, we review the results from pilot studies into urinary proteomics of coronary artery disease and discuss the potential of urinary proteomics in the context of pathogenesis of CVD.