Tumour necrosis factor-alpha promoter polymorphism and its association with viral dilated cardiomyopathy in Indian population: a pilot study.

PURPOSE: Tumour necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), a pro-inflammatory cytokine has been implicated in the pathophysiology of several viral infections. TNF-α promoter gene polymorphism is thus believed to play the modulating role in this disease pathogenesis. Several studies have shown the increased level of TNF-α in dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM). However, the role of the TNF-α promoter polymorphism is yet to be delineated in this regard. The present study for the first time tried to explore the association of TNF-α gene polymorphism with DCM of viral aetiology.

MATERIALS AND

METHODS

Eighteen histopathologically proven DCM cases with viral genome positivity and 17 healthy controls were genotyped using polymerase chain reaction of TNF-α promoter gene followed by restriction fragment length polymorphism to determine the SNPs of -238G/A, -308G/A, -857C/T and -863C/A.

RESULTS

Of the 18 DCM cases 4 (22.2%) were positive for adenovirus (AdV), 2 (11.1%) for enterovirus (EV) and 12 (66.7%) had co-infection. Six of the 18 DCM cases (35.3%) had -238G/A polymorphism, and 10 (55.5%) had -863 homozygous AA genotype. The association of these polymorphisms was statistically significant as compared to controls (P < 0.05).

CONCLUSIONS

The present pilot study suggests the possible association of TNFα -238G/A and -863C/A polymorphism with DCM of viral aetiology.