The aim of this study was to compare the frequencies of five HLA-E alleles
in 82 women with recurrent spontaneous abortions with that of 150 random Da
nish controls, PCR sequence-specific oligonucleotide ts ping was carried ou
t to detect polymorphism in exons 2 and 3 of the HLA-E gene, In informative
samples sequencing of these two exons was also undertaken to confirm the p
resence of the HLA-E*01031 allele. HLA-E*0101, HLA-E*01032 and HLA-E*01031
were detected with frequencies of 56.7%, 33.6% and 9.6% in controls and 58,
5%, 32.9% and 8.5% in patients with recurrent abortion, respectively No HLA
-E*0102 and E*0104 alleles could be detected. Since the HLA-E allele distri
bution was similar in women with recurrent spontaneous abortion and control
s, it is suggested that maternal HLA-E polymorphism prl sc does not play an
y role in the pathogenesis of this disorder of pregnancy.