HLA antigens in Stevens-Johnson syndrome with ocular involvement

Fifteen white patients and three black patients with Stevens-Johnson syndrome (SJS) with ocular involvement had HLA typing performed. The HLA-Bw44 antigen was found to have an increased frequency of 66.7% in white patients with SJS with ocular involvement, which was statistically significant when compared with a frequency of 20.4% in the white control population. The results of this study suggest that there is an immunogenetic susceptibility to the development of SJS with ocular manifestations in white patients.