HLA and autoimmune endocrine disease 1985

We typed patient groups with type I diabetes (n = 78), Graves' disease (n = 81), goitrous autoimmune (n = 52), "silent" (n = 18) and postpartum thyroiditis (n = 15) for human leucocyte antigens (HLA) A, B, C, DR and DQ. The results were compared to those obtained from 256 healthy controls typed for HLA-A, -B, -C and 140 typed for -DR. All these 140 controls were genotyped. Previously described associations of DR3 (OR (odds ratio) = 2.68, p less than 0.005) and DR4 (OR = 3.26, p less than 0.0001) in type I diabetes is confirmed. In this series, however, HLA-DR3/DR4 heterozygotes were apparently at no greater risk for type I diabetes than DR3 or DR4 homozygotes. The relative risk conferred by DR3/DR4 heterozygotes (6.48) was less than that for DR3 homozygosity (2.8), suggesting a recessive major histocompatibility complex-related susceptibility to type I diabetes. Graves' disease was associated with DR3 (OR = 3.02, p less than 0.0005); the increased frequency of DR3 homozygotes in this series is consistent with recessive HLA-linked susceptibility to Graves' disease proposed on the basis of family data. Hashimoto's thyroiditis, on the other hand, was associated with HLA-DR4 (OR = 3.08, p less than 0.0001), the latter finding confirming our earlier report on 21 patients. The increase of HLA-DR4 in both post-partum and silent thyroiditis suggests that these conditions are immunogenetically related, and may well represent variants of chronic autoimmune thyroiditis.