HLA CLASS-II ASSOCIATIONS IN JUVENILE GRAVES-DISEASE - INDICATION OF A STRONG PROTECTIVE ROLE OF THE DRB1-ASTERISK-0701,DQA1-ASTERISK-0201 HAPLOTYPE

Previous studies have shown that HLA-DRB10301 and DQA1*0501 are assoc iated with susceptibility to Graves' disease. Ninety Danish patients w ith early onset of Graves' disease and 102-192 controls were analyzed for HLA-DR and -DQ to investigate if the same associations exist in th e juvenile form of Graves' disease. Both DRB10301 and DQA1*0501 were highly significantly increased in the patients with relative risks of 8.0 and 4.6, which are higher than those seen in adults. Stratificatio n showed that DRB10301 is more strongly associated than DQA1*0501. Su rprisingly, the DRB10701,DQA1*0201 haplotype was completely absent fr om this group of patients, indicating a strong protective role of this haplotype in juvenile Graves' disease.