Despite the rapid progress in diagnosis and treatment of cardiovascular disease (CVD), this disease remains a major cause of mortality and morbidity. Recent progress over the last two decades in the field of molecular genetics, especially with new tools such as genome-wide association studies, has helped to identify new genes and their variants, which can be used for calculations of risk, prediction of treatment efficacy, or detection of subjects prone to drug side effects. Although the use of genetic risk scores further improves CVD prediction, the significance is not unambiguous, and some subjects at risk remain undetected. Further research directions should focus on the "second level" of genetic information, namely, regulatory molecules (miRNAs) and epigenetic changes, predominantly DNA methylation and gene-environment interactions.

3rd Department of Internal Medicine General University Hospital and 1st Faculty of Medicine Charles University 11636 Prague Czech Republic

Department of Epidemiology and Public Health Institute of Epidemiology and Health Care University College London London WC1E 7HB UK

Experimental Medicine Centre Institute for Clinical and Experimental Medicine 14021 Prague Czech Republic

References provided by Crossref.org