PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Rachelle Donn
AU  - Eleftheria Zeggini
AU  - Emma Shelley
AU  - William Ollier
AU  - Wendy Thomson
AU  - British Paediatric Rheumatology Study Group
TI  - Lack of association between juvenile idiopathic arthritis and fas gene polymorphism.
DP  - 2002 Jan 01
TA  - The Journal of Rheumatology
PG  - 166--168
VI  - 29
IP  - 1
4099  - http://www.jrheum.org/content/29/1/166.short
4100  - http://www.jrheum.org/content/29/1/166.full
SO  - J Rheumatol2002 Jan 01; 29
AB  - OBJECTIVE: Juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) is a complex genetic disease of autoimmune etiology. Fas is a molecule with a pivotal role in apoptosis and hence in immune regulation. Elevated transcriptional levels of Fas in the synovial fluid of patients with JIA suggest that it might be implicated in disease etiopathogenesis. We investigated whether a polymorphism in the Fas promoter region (-670) confers susceptibility to JIA. METHODS: In this association study, 342 UK patients with JIA and 255 healthy individuals were genotyped for the polymorphism using polymerase chain reaction restriction fragment length polymorphism. Comparisons of the genotypic frequencies were made using chi-square analysis. RESULTS: No statistically significant differences were found when the genotype frequencies of the -670 Fas polymorphism were compared between the JIA cases and the control panel. Similarly, no differences were seen between the JIA subgroups, or when the patients were divided on the basis of rheumatoid factor or antinuclear antibody positivity. CONCLUSION: The -670 polymorphism of Fas does not appear to be associated with susceptibility to JIA.