EXTENDED REPORT

HLA class II is associated with distal interphalangeal osteoarthritis

N Riyazi¹, J Spee¹, T W J Huizinga¹, G M T Schreuder², R R P de Vries², F W Dekker³, M Kloppenburg¹

¹ Department of Rheumatology, Leiden University Medical Centre, the Netherlands
² Department of Immunohaematology and Blood Transfusion, Leiden University Medical Centre
³ Department of Clinical Epidemiology, Leiden University Medical Centre

Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Dr N Riyazi, Leiden University Medical Centre, Department of Rheumatology, C4-R, PO Box 9600, 2300 RC Leiden, The Netherlands;
N.Riyazi{at}lumc.nl

Objective: To investigate whether there is an association between HLA class II and distal interphalangeal osteoarthritis (DIP OA).

Methods: The study group consisted of consecutive patients with and without DIP OA aged between 40 and 70 years. DIP OA was diagnosed by radiology. These patients were referred to an "Early Arthritis Clinic" (EAC) with different types of arthritis at an early stage. Patients with rheumatoid arthritis, systemic lupus erythematosus, spondyloarthropathies, and psoriatic arthritis were excluded for the purpose of this study. DNA typing for HLA-DR and x ray examination of the hands were performed at enrolment in the EAC. To establish whether the study group was representative of the Dutch population, a population based study in Zoetermeer (n=3243) for the prevalence of DIP OA and blood donors in the Leiden area (n=2400) for the HLA-DR antigen frequencies were used as references.

Results: Fifty five patients (33%) of the total study group (n=166) had DIP OA. The prevalence of DIP OA and frequency of the HLA-DR alleles were similar to those of the two reference groups. Within the study group an association between DIP OA and HLA-DR2 and DR4 with respectively odds ratios of 2.4 (95% confidence interval (CI) 1.1 to 5.0) and 0.3 (95% CI 0.1 to 0.7) was found. No association was found between other HLA-DR alleles and DIP OA.

Conclusion: The study group is a representative sample of the Dutch population. The HLA-DR2 allele was more common in patients with DIP OA. Furthermore, an inverse relation was observed between DIP OA and HLA-DR4. The results confirm findings from other investigations implicating HLA-DR2 as a risk factor in the development of DIP OA.

Keywords: hand; osteoarthritis; HLA class II; genetics

Abbreviations: CI, confidence interval; DIP, distal interphalangeal; E, expected; EAC, Early Arthritis Clinic; O, observed; OA, osteoarthritis; OR, odds ratio

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