title: Association of vascular endothelial growth factor -634G/C and receptor for advanced glycation end products G82S gene polymorphisms with diabetic retinopathy.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To investigate the association of receptor for advanced glycation end products (RAGE) G82S and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) -634 G/C gene polymorphisms with diabetic retinopathy (DR).
  
  
  METHODS
  Our cross-sectional study included 61 diabetic patients, 12 of them had proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR), 15 had non proliferative diabetic retinopathy (NPDR), 34 had no diabetic retinopathy (NDR) and 61 healthy controls. Participants were tested for RAGE G82S and VEGF -634 G/C polymorphisms by polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism.
  
  
  RESULTS
  We found a significant association between VEGF -634 G/C polymorphism and PDR as PDR patients had increased incidence of VEGF -634 CC genotype compared to NDR patients [odds ratio for CC vs (GC+GG)=6.5, 95% CI=1.5-27.8, P=0.021]. Also VEGF -634 CC genotype and C allele were significantly higher in the PDR than in NPDR patients, which is a novel finding in our study (P=0.024, 0.009 respectively). The mean triglycerides level was significantly higher in diabetic patients with CC genotype (P=0.01) as compared to patients with other genotypes. All cases and control subjects were of the same heterozygous RAGE 82G/S genotype.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Patients carrying VEGF -634 C polymorphism have a higher risk of PDR development, so VEGF -634 G/C polymorphism could be used as a predictive marker for PDR in diabetic patients. We could not find a significant association between RAGE G82S polymorphism and DR.
authors: Department of Clinical & Chemical Pathology, Faculty of Medicine, Cairo University, Cairo 11562, Egypt.
authors: Asmaa
authors: A
authors: Kamal
authors: Department of Ophthalmology, Faculty of Medicine, Cairo University, Cairo 11562, Egypt.
authors: Khaled
authors: K
authors: Abu Eleinen
authors: Internal Medicine Department, National Research Center, Cairo 12311, Egypt.
authors: Ibrahem
authors: I
authors: Siam
keywords: diabetic retinopathy; gene polymorphism; receptor for advanced glycation end products; vascular endothelial growth factor