Qamar, Safi Ur Rehman

Background/Objectives: Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) is a common heart disorder characterized by the thickening of the heart muscle, particularly in the left ventricle, which increases the risk of cardiac complications. This study aims to analyze the expression of apoptosis-regulating genes (CASP8, CASP9, CASP3, BAX, and BCL2) in blood samples from HCM patients, to better understand their potential as biomarkers for disease progression. Methods: Quantitative real-time PCR (qPCR) was used to evaluate gene expression in blood samples from 93 HCM patients. The correlation between apoptosis-regulating genes was conducted and clinical parameters were integrated for feature importance and clustering analysis. Results: Most patients exhibited significant downregulation of CASP8, CASP9, and CASP3. In contrast, BAX expression was elevated in 71 out of 93 patients, while BCL2 was increased in 55 out of 93 patients. Correlation analysis revealed weak negative correlations between the BAX/BCL2 ratio and CASP gene expression. Conclusions: These findings suggest that reduced expression of apoptotic genes may indicate a protective cellular mechanism, which could serve as a biomarker for disease progression. Further studies are needed to investigate the potential for therapeutic modulation of these pathways to improve patient outcomes.