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The fibromyalgia family study: a genome-wide linkage scan study
Lesley M Arnold1, Jinbo Fan, I Jon Russell
1Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, Ohio 44106, USA. Lesley.Arnold@uc.edu
Objective:
Familial aggregation of fibromyalgia has been increasingly recognized. The goal of this study was to conduct a genome-wide linkage scan to identify susceptibility loci for fibromyalgia.
Methods:
We genotyped members of 116 families from the Fibromyalgia Family Study and performed a model-free genome-wide linkage analysis of fibromyalgia with 341 microsatellite markers, using the Haseman-Elston regression approach.
Results:
The estimated sibling recurrence risk ratio (λs ) for fibromyalgia was 13.6 (95% confidence interval 10.0-18.5), based on a reported population prevalence of 2%. Genome-wide suggestive evidence of linkage was observed at markers D17S2196 (empirical P [Pe ]=0.00030) and D17S1294 (Pe=0.00035) on chromosome 17p11.2-q11.2.
Conclusion:
The estimated sibling recurrence risk ratio (λs ) observed in this study suggests a strong genetic component of fibromyalgia. This is the first report of genome-wide suggestive linkage of fibromyalgia to the chromosome 17p11.2-q11.2 region. Further investigation of these multicase families from the Fibromyalgia Family Study is warranted to identify potential causal risk variants for fibromyalgia.
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