Furthermore, to explore the hypothesis that the concomitant presence of other systemic conditions may interfere with the high hs-CRP levels in PD patients, we compared hs-CRP levels in PD patients with and without diabetes mellitus (p = 0.130), hypertension (p = 0.844), coronary heart disease (p = 0.405), emphysema (p = 0.365), asthma (p = 0.184), hepatic conditions (p = 0.888) or cancer (p = 0.354). The gene discussed is MAP3K14; the disease is pulmonary emphysema.