Association between estrogen receptor gene polymorphism in vitiligo patients and their clinical data

    LU Ning1, GAO Tianª²Wen1, YAO Qingª²Jun2, ZHAO Ming3, LI Kai1, YANG Li1, GAO Chao4

    1Department of Dermatology, 2Department of Burn and Cutaneous Surgery£¬Xijing Hospital, 4Cadet Brigade, Fourth Military Medical University£¬Xi¬ðan 710033, China, 3Department of Dermatology, Affiliated Hospital, Engineering College of Chinese Armed Police Force, Xi¬ðan 710048, China

    ¡¾Abstract¡¿ AIM: To study the association between estrogen receptorª²¦Á(ERª²¦Á)gene polymorphism in vitiligo patients and their clinical data. METHODS: Polymerase chain reactionª²restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCRª²RFLP) was used to study the ERª²¦Á intron 1 Pvu II C/T (rs2234693) polymorphisms in 466 patients with vitiligo. Genotypes were determined and allele frequencies were compared to find their relationship with their clinical data. RESULTS: The genotype and allele frequency distributions were not significantly different among vitiligo patients with different subtypes, sex, onset age, with/without other autoimmune diseases and family history (P>0.05), while P values were in the range of 0.081-0.364 between segmental and two generalized type vitiligo patients (segmental vs universal, P=0.100; segmental vs common, P=0.081). And P values were near 0.05 when the C/T genotype frequency was compared between onset age of lower than 12 years old and of 12-20 years old (P=0.085); P values were also low in comparisons of genotype (P=0.195) and allele frequencies (P=0.165) between the male and the female patients. CONCLUSION: When the genotype and allele frequencies of the ERª²¦Á intron 1 C/T polymorphism were compared among vitiligo patients with different subtypes, sex, onset age, with/without other autoimmune diseases and family history, no significant difference was observed. However, a tendency of significant differences was observed in comparisons of female and male vitiligo patients, segmental and generalized types, and different onset age (<12 years old vs 12-20 years old). ERª²¦Á gene may be a possible risk factor especially for the female, generalized type or children vitiligo patients. ......