association between ala379val ‎polymorphism of lipoprotein-‎associated phospholipase ‎a2 and migraine without ‎aura in iranian population

background: migraine is a common neurovascular disorder with multifactorial and polygenic inheritance. the aim of this study was to investigate the association of a migraine without aura and ala379val polymorphism of lipoprotein-associated phospholipase a2 (lp-pla2) gene in the iranian population. methods: in this study, 103 migraine patients and 100 healthy controls were enrolled. dna samples were extracted and the ala379val polymorphism of lp-pla2 gene was investigated. to assess severity of a headache, patients filled out the headache impact test (hit-6) and migraine severity (migsev) questionnaires. results: allele v had significantly lower frequency in the case group than control subjects [p = 0.001, odds ratio (or) = 0.25, confidence interval (ci): 0.15-0.40]. the frequency of migraine patients that were a carrier of v allele (v/v and a/v) was statistically significant lower than the control group (p = 0.003, or = 2.39, ci: 1.35-4.23). there was no significant difference of alleles frequency between three grades of migsev (p = 0.316). furthermore, total hit-6 score was not significantly different between different genotypes (p = 0.466). conclusion: our results showed that ala379val gene polymorphism of lp-pla2 is associated with lower risk of migraine but not with severity of headaches in an iranian population.