Table 1 Characteristics of the patient and control populations.

	Patients	Healthy UK subjects	p Value (patients v controls)
Age	55 (range 24–80)	56 (range 49–64)	0.01
Sex (M:F)	40:60	All males	<0.0001
Smoking	50%	28.2%	<0.0001
Hypertension*	51%	30%	<0.0001
Diabetes	2%	2.4%	0.62
IL‐6 genotype (−174G>C)
GG/GC/CC, n (%)	40 (47)/40 (47)/6 (7)	867 (32)/1358 (50)/495 (18)	0.003
Frequency of C allele (95% CI)	0.30 (0.23 to 0.37)	0.43 (0.42 to 0.44)	0.001
IL‐6 genotype (−572G>C)
GG/GC/CC, n (%)	79 (86.8)/8 (8.8)/4 (4.4)	2359 (90.4)/244 (9.3)/9 (0.3)	0.001
Frequency of C allele (95% CI)	0.09 (0.05 to 0.13)	0.05 (0.04 to 0.06)	0.02

*Systolic hypertension >160 mm Hg or diastolic hypertension <100 mm Hg.