Genetic polymorphism of the infl ammatory cytokines IL-1β and IL-6 in patients with serologically identifi ed atrophic gastritis

Background: some researchers have demonstrated a link between the genetic polymorphism of certain pro-infl ammatory cytokines (IL-1β, IL-6) and the risk of developing precancerous diseases of the stomach and gastric cancer (GC).

Aim: to study the genotypes and alleles frequency of polymorphisms of –511C/T (rs16944) of the IL1B gene and 174G/C (rs1800795) of the IL6 gene in patients with serologically detected atrophic gastritis (AG) — the main precancerous lesions of the stomach.

Materials and methods. the study included 55 people (45 females and10 males) with an average age of 58.2 ± 11.5 years with signs of obvious or possible atrophy of diff erent parts of the gastric mucosa revealed by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) with determination of pepsinogen levels I (PGI), PGII, the PGI / PGII ratio, gastrin-17 and IgG antibodies to H. pylori using the “GastroPanel” diagnostic kit (Biohit Plc, Helsinski, Finland). DNA was isolated from venous blood using the phenol-chloroform extraction method. DNA samples were genotyped according to published methods.

Results: in patients with severe AG (PGI level less than 30 μg/l), the combined variant with the rare T allele (T/T + C/T) was detected signifi cantly more often (68.8%) than the common homozygous C/C variant (31, 3%, p = 0.004). In individuals with a low PGI/PGII ratio (less than 3), which is also evidence of fundamental atrophy, the homozygous T/T variant was more common (29.6%) than the C/C genotype (7.4%, p = 0.04) The average PGI values were signifi cantly lower with the C/C genotype of the IL-6 gene compared with the heterozygous C/G variant (p = 0.03), however, in patients with morphologically confi rmed atrophy, the  combined variant with the rare G allele (G/G + C/G) of the IL6 gene was more common than the homozygous C/C variant (71.4% versus 28.6%, p = 001).

Conclusions: in patients with signs of corpus atrophy (low PGI, PGI PGII ratios), the homozygous variant with a rare T allele, which is associated with increased IL-1β production and the development of a hypoacid state, was 4 times more likely than the homozygous C/C variant (p = 0.04). The results obtained suggest a possible association of IL1B polymorphism (carriage of a rare T allele) with the formation of a cancer phenotype of gastritis. The contribution of IL6 polymorphism requires further refi nement.

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