[Association between apolipoprotein E polymorphism and Alzheimer's disease: A population-based study in Guangzhou, China].
OBJECTIVE
To investigate the distribution of apolipoprotein E (apoE) genotype of patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) in the population aged 75 and older in Guangzhou and to determine whether there was an association between AD and apoE epsilon4 allele.


METHODS
A systematic cluster sampling design, two-stage screening and field evaluations were used in a cross-sectional population-based study. Three thousand eight handred and twenty-five subjects aged 75 and above in Liwan district of Guangzhou were interviewed. Blood samples were collected from 110 cases and 518 normal controls. The criteria of DSM-III-R and NINCDS-ADRDA were used for clinical diagnosis of probable AD. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) were used to determine apoE genotypes.


RESULTS
There were 190 cases diagnosed as sporadic AD from this sample. The frequencies of the three apoE alleles were detected as follows: epsilon2 = 0.100, epsilon3 = 0.832, epsilon4 = 0.068 in AD patients; epsilon2 = 0.092, epsilon3 = 0.843, epsilon4 = 0.065 in normal controls. The frequencies of apoE genotype and allele in the AD patients were not significantly different from that in normal subjects (P > 0.05).


CONCLUSIONS
No association between sporadic AD and apoE epsilon4 allele was found among the population aged 75 and above in Liwan district of Guangzhou.
Lai
S
S
Guangzhou University of Tradition Chinese Medicine, Guangzhou 510405, China.
Chen
Y
Y
Wen
Z
Z
D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000235:genetics*; D001057:Apolipoproteins E / Q000235:genetics*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011110:Polymorphism, Genetic
D001057:Apolipoproteins E