Genetic association of HLA-A*2601 with ocular Behçet's disease in Japanese patients.
OBJECTIVE
Behçet's disease (BD) is known to be associated with HLA-B*51, especially HLA-B*5101, in many different ethnic groups. Recently, several HLA-A or -B alleles have been proposed as possible candidate genes for BD in addition to HLA-B*5101. To investigate those associations, we studied HLA-A and -B alleles in Japanese ocular BD patients and the association of possible susceptibility HLA genes with visual prognosis.


METHODS
Eighty-eight Japanese BD patients with uveitis and 104 healthy controls were enrolled for analyses of HLA-A and B alleles. Statistical analysis was performed with Fisher's exact test and odds ratio (OR). Association of the possible susceptible HLA gene and visual prognosis was also examined.


RESULTS
The phenotype frequency (PF) of HLA-A*2601 was significantly higher in the patients (37.5%) than the controls (14.4%) (pc=0.00529, OR=3.56), especially in patients without HLA-B*5101 (57.4% vs. 14.1%, pc=4.58x10-6, OR=8.21). In contrast, the PF of HLA-A*2601 was not increased in patients with HLA-B*5101 (14.6% vs. 15.8%). Also, the PF in patients possessing HLA-A*2601 or HLAB* 5101 was increased up to 77.3%. Interestingly, the PF of HLA-A*2601 was significantly associated with poor visual prognosis corresponding to visual acuity of 0.1 or less in the worse eye (p=0.0262).


CONCLUSIONS
Our results indicate that HLA-A*2601 is possibly associated with ocular BD, independent of HLAB* 5101, indicating that HLA-A*2601 is an additional susceptibility allele candidate of ocular BD in Japan. HLAA* 2601 would also be a possible marker for poor visual prognosis.
Kaburaki
Toshikatsu
T
Department of Ophthalmology, University of Tokyo Graduate School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan. kabutosi-tky@umin.ac.jp
Takamoto
Mitsuko
M
Numaga
Jiro
J
Kawashima
Hidetoshi
H
Araie
Makoto
M
Ohnogi
Yuka
Y
Harihara
Shinji
S
Kuwata
Shoji
S
Takeuchi
Fujio
F
D000328:Adult; D000483:Alleles; D001528:Behcet Syndrome / Q000150:complications / Q000208:ethnology* / Q000235:genetics*; D015415:Biomarkers; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D020022:Genetic Predisposition to Disease / Q000208:ethnology / Q000235:genetics; D015234:HLA-A Antigens / Q000235:genetics*; D015235:HLA-B Antigens / Q000235:genetics; D006801:Humans; D007564:Japan; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011379:Prognosis; D014605:Uveitis / Q000208:ethnology* / Q000209:etiology / Q000235:genetics*
D015415:Biomarkers; D015234:HLA-A Antigens; C541137:HLA-A*26:01 antigen; D015235:HLA-B Antigens