Sato M, Ohashi J, Tsuchiya N, Kashiwase K, Ishikawa Y, Arita H, Hanaoka K, Tokunaga K, Yabe T
Department of Research, Tokyo Metropolitan Red Cross Blood Center, Tokyo, 150-0012 Japan.
Genes Immun. 2002 Dec;3(8):477-81. doi: 10.1038/sj.gene.6363890.
Herpes zoster is a common disease caused by reactivation of the varicella zoster virus (VZV). In a small number of herpes zoster patients, pain persists beyond 4 weeks or more after healing of vesicular eruptions; this condition is termed postherpetic neuralgia (PHN). Positive associations of human histocompatibility leukocyte antigens (HLA) class I antigens, A33 and B44, with PHN in the Japanese population have been reported. Our hypothesis is that susceptibility genes to PHN might exist in the HLA region and the study objective is to further examine possible associations of genes in HLA class I, II and III regions, HLA-A, -B, -DRB1, tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNFA) promoter, and a natural killer cell activating receptor, NKp30 polymorphisms with PHN. Although TNFA or NKp30 in the class III region had been considered as a candidate locus, we found no associations of TNFA promoter or NKp30 polymorphisms with PHN in this study. We demonstrated that HLA-A3303, -B4403 and -DRB11302 alleles were significantly associated with PHN (P = 0.0007 for A3303, P = 0.001 for B4403 and P = 0.001 for DRB11302). The frequency of the HLA-A3303-B4403-DRB1*1302 haplotype was also significantly higher in the PHN patients than in the healthy controls (P = 0.0039). Our results suggest that this haplotype might be related to the pathogenesis of PHN.
带状疱疹是由水痘-带状疱疹病毒（VZV）重新激活引起的常见疾病。在少数带状疱疹患者中，疼痛在水疱皮疹愈合后持续4周或更长时间；这种情况被称为带状疱疹后神经痛（PHN）。据报道，在日本人群中，人类组织相容性白细胞抗原（HLA）I类抗原A33和B44与PHN呈正相关。我们的假设是，PHN的易感基因可能存在于HLA区域，研究目的是进一步研究HLA I、II和III区域的基因、HLA-A、-B、-DRB1、肿瘤坏死因子α（TNFA）启动子以及自然杀伤细胞激活受体NKp30多态性与PHN的可能关联。尽管III类区域的TNFA或NKp30曾被认为是候选基因座，但在本研究中我们未发现TNFA启动子或NKp30多态性与PHN有关联。我们证明HLA-A3303、-B4403和-DRB11302等位基因与PHN显著相关（A3303的P = 0.0007，B4403的P = 0.001，DRB11302的P = 0.001）。PHN患者中HLA-A3303-B4403-DRB1*1302单倍型的频率也显著高于健康对照组（P = 0.0039）。我们的结果表明，这种单倍型可能与PHN的发病机制有关。
