ACE gene I/D polymorphism and risk of sarcoidosis development in Turkish patients.

INTRODUCTION Etiology of sarcoidosis is unknown but the prevalence of disease in different ethnic groups and identical twins, family characteristics indicate that genetic predisposition is a possible factor. The angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) has been implicated in the pahophysiology of sarcoidosis. The aim of this study is to investigate the influence of a polymorphism in I/D (Insertion/Deletion) of the ACE gene on the susceptibility to sarcoidosis. PATIENTS AND METHODS Our study included 70 Turkish patients who had histopathological diagnosis of sarcoidosis and 69 healthy age and sex matched control subjects. Polymerase chain reaction was used for analysing an I/D polymorphism in the gene coding for ACE. Genotyping was done according to bands that were formed on the agarose gel electrophoresis. Chi-square test was used for statistical analysis and p< 0.05 was accepted as significance. RESULTS Although the D allele was more frequent in the sarcoidosis patients group, the frequency of the D allele was 67% and 54% respectively in the sarcoidosis and the control group. No significant difference in allele frequencies of I/I, I/D, D/D polymorphisms was observed between the sarcoidosis and control group (p> 0.05). Similarly allele frequencies of I/I, I/D, D/D polymorphisms was not different between sarcoidosis patients with extrapulmonary involvement and sarcoidosis patients without extrapulmonary involvement (p> 0.05). CONCLUSION Our findings have showed that contribution of ACE gene polymorphisms to susceptibility of disease development in Turkish sarcoidosis patients is not different from the healthy control subjects.