Molecular and Cellular Pediatrics

Molecular and Cellular Pediatrics Cover Image

Volume 1 Supplement 1

Abstracts of the 50th Workshop for Pediatric Research

Meeting abstract
Open Access

Genetic risk factors for respiratory diseases of preterm infants

  • Friederike Pagel1,
  • Sarah Leick1,
  • Michael Preuß2,
  • Christoph Härtel1,
  • Egbert Herting1 and
  • Wolfgang Göpel1
Molecular and Cellular Pediatrics20141(Suppl 1):A3

https://doi.org/10.1186/2194-7791-1-S1-A3

©  Pagel et al; licensee Springer 2014

Published: 11 September 2014

Aims

Genetic variants of pulmonary surface glycoproteins like Muc5a and Muc5b are known to affect mucociliary clearance, control of infections and maybe associated with pulmonary fibrosis [1–3]. We tested the hypothesis that Muc5b (rs35705950) is associated with bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) in mechanically ventilated preterm infants. In addition, we aimed to identify common variants associated with the need for surfactant treatment.

Methods

Preterm infants with a birth weight below 1500 grams born in the GNN were genotyped for rs35705950 (n=8029). Furthermore, 1272 infants were chip-genotyped (AXIOM genome wide array, GWA), and candidate polymorphisms were replicated in two additional groups of preterm infants (n=3839 and n=2830).

Results

Frequencies for rs35705950 were in the expected range (GG 82%, GT 17%, TT 1%). The GT/TT-genotype was a strong genetic risk factor for the development of BPD in ventilated infants with sepsis (OR 5.7 95%CI 2-15; p=4.2 x 10-5). In GWA, we identified 10 candidate polymorphisms however, only one minor allele proved to be associated with a reduced need for surfactant treatment in preterm infants (OR 0.7, 95%CI 0.6-0.8, p=3.8 x 10-8 corrected for gestational age).

Conclusion

Common polymorphisms are associated with respiratory disease in preterm infants. Our data indicate that personalized treatment stratified for genetic factors might be a useful approach for future therapy in neonates.

Note

Wolfgang Göpel for the German Neonatal Network (GNN).

Authors’ Affiliations

(1)
Department of Paediatrics, University of Lübeck, UKSH
(2)
Institute of Medical Biometry and Statistics, University of Lübeck

References

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  2. Roy MG, et al.: Nature. 2014, 505: 412–6.PubMed CentralPubMedView ArticleGoogle Scholar
  3. Seibold MA, et al.: N Engl J Med. 2011, 364: 1503–12. 10.1056/NEJMoa1013660PubMed CentralPubMedView ArticleGoogle Scholar

Copyright

© Pagel et al; licensee Springer 2014

This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.