LCAT and atherosclerosis: Finally, we have pursued the argument in this paper on the premise that LCAT activity represents an atherosclerosis-promoting factor; however, we may have to discuss with great deliberation whether LCAT facilitates, or in fact, suppresses atherosclerosis on the ground of evidence heretofore accumulated, by taking account of differences in LCAT assay procedure and characteristics of the study subjects (general population, high-risk cases of cardiovascular disease, gender) and of the expression profile of the LCAT gene in the pathophysiological state [29, 30].