Background: Recurrent aphthous stomatitis is a common condition characterised by recurrent episodes of oral ulceration. Genetic factors have been implicated by numerous studies on the association of recurrent aphthous stomatitis and the genetically determined HLA subtypes.
Objectives: Current study was established to shed light on the possible association of HLA class I and II alleles with recurrent aphthous stomatitis in Iraqi patients.
Subjects and Methods: The study included 55 subjects: 30 recurrent aphthous stomatitis patients and 25 apparently healthy subjects as control. Polymerase chain reaction-specific sequence primers (PCR- SSP) assay was conducted to assess HLA- typing.
Results: The present study showed a significant association of HLA-Cw*12:02:01-and HLADQB1* 02:01:01- alleles with recurrent aphthous stomatitis as compared with healthy control (P=
0.041and P=0.028 respectively). Another interesting finding in this study was the significant low frequency of HLA-DQB1*05:01:01- allele in patients when compared with healthy control (P=0.036).
Conclusion: These findings demonstrated that HLA-Cw*12:02:01- and HLA-DQB1*02:01:01-alleles may play a role in the etiology of the disease. Whereas HLA-DQB1*05:01:01-05 may confer protective effects against recurrent aphthous stomatitis.
