• Margareta Kristenson, Zita Kucinskiené, Liselotte Schäfer-Elinder, Per Leanderson, and Christer Tagesson.
• Department of Health and Society, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden. margareta.kristenson@lio.se
• Nutrition. 2003 Jan 1; 19 (1): 11-5.

ObjectiveIn 1995, middle-aged Lithuanian men had a four-fold higher risk than Swedish men of dying from coronary heart disease. The cross-sectional LiVicordia study had reported significantly lower levels of the lipid-soluble antioxidants lycopene, beta-carotene, and gamma-tocopherol among Lithuanian men than among Swedish men. We examined whether there were differences in urinary 8-hydroxydeoxyguanosine (8OHdG), a marker of oxidative stress, between these groups of men.MethodsUsing automated coupled column high-performance liquid chromatography with electrochemical detection, we examined 50-y-old men randomly sampled from Linköping, Sweden (n = 99) and Vilnius, Lithuania (n = 109) with regard to urinary concentrations of 8-OHdG.ResultsLevels of 8-OHdG were higher in the Lithuanian men than in the Swedish men (20.9 +/- 0.91 versus 14.9 +/- 0.75 nM/L, P < 0.001), and this difference was evident in smokers (P < 0.01) and non-smokers (P < 0.001). Serum levels of alpha- and beta-carotene were inversely correlated to urinary 8-OHdG levels (P < 0.05 in both cases). Habitual smoking and low levels of beta-carotene contributed significantly to higher oxidative DNA damage expressed as urinary 8-OHdG.ConclusionsThese findings indicate that increased urinary 8-OHdG levels accompany lower serum levels of antioxidants in Lithuanian men. They supported previous suggestions that increased oxidative stress may be one factor behind the higher mortality in Lithuanian men.

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