Serotonin transporter (5-HTT) gene polymorphism in psychogeriatric patients

Several studies have attempted to confirm an association between a deletion /insertion polymorphism within the promoter region of the serotonin transpo rter gene (5-HTT) a nd Alzheimer's disease independent from the apolipoprot ein E (APOE) epsilon 4 status. We examined this deletion/insertion polymorp hism of the serotonin transporter gene in a sample of 222 consecutively rec ruited gerontopsychiatric patients which was divided into four different di agnostic groups: Alzheimer's disease (N = 84), mild cognitive impairment(N = 29), subjective cognitive complaints (N = 49), depression/other psych iat ric disorders (N = 56) and 118 healthy, non-demented controls. The aim of t h is approach was to test whether the investigated polymorphism has a high enough selectivity and specificity to distinguish between the different ger ontopsychiatric disorders or to differentiate genetically AD from other for ms of dementia, respectively. We could not detect any significant differenc es in the allelic distribution of the deletion/insertion polymorphism of th e 5-HTT gene between the four patient subgroups and the control group. This finding indicates that the serotonin transporter does not appear to be a m ajor susceptibility factor in the pathophysiology of Alzheimer's disease an d other psychogeriatric disorders. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd. A ll rights reserved.