In patients with T2DM, PCSK9 correlated inversely with both CD45neg/CD34bright (Rho = − 0.409, p = 0.006) and CD45neg/CD34bright/CD146neg (Rho = − 0.448, p = 0.002) (Fig. 3C,F), while such correlation was not observed in patients without T2DM (Fig. 3B,E). Here, PCSK9 is linked to type 2 diabetes mellitus.