Association between HLA-DQB1 gene and patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL)

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) affects both children and adults. Survival in ALL has improved in recent decades due to recognition of its biological heterogeneity. Although children have higher remission and cure rates than adults, both populations have benefited from these improvements. Our aim in this study is to determine the association between HLA-DQB1 genes with childhood and adult ALL patients. To define this association, we compared HLA-DQB1 allele frequencies and allele carrier frequencies in a cohort of 135 adults and children with ALL with 150 controls, using polymerase chain reaction with sequence-specific primers. Allele carrier frequencies in childhood ALL show a deficiency in DQ2 (*0201) (P 0.049 and RR 0.75), but an increase in DQ5 (*0501-*0504) and DQ7 (*0301, *0304) compared to the control group (P 0.001 RR 1.89, P 0.003 RR 1.48, respectively). Allele carrier frequencies in adult ALL indicated an increase in DQ5 (*0501-*0504) (P0.045 RR 2.28). Allelic frequencies in childhood ALL revealed the same increase in DQ5 and DQ7, and a decrease in DQ2. In adult ALL it shows a decrease in DQ7. Therefore, our results in adult ALL were similar to childhood ALL addressing DQ5 allele carriers, which showed an increase in both age groups. We suggest that DQ5 could be more strongly considered as an ALL susceptibility allele, and that this allele may underlie a pathogenic phenotype with a major role in the immunologic process involved in both adults and children with ALL.