Genetic Linkage Of Gene Polymorphisms To Chinese Ischaemic Stroke

Despite intensive research strokes remain the third commonest cause of mortality in the western world apart from heart disease and combined malignancies, and the first cause of mortality in China. Treatment for strokes has still been largely supportive, and the prevention of strokes has remained the most practical method for control of the disease, but this has largely concentrated on treatment of hypertension. The impact of stroke on society is outweighed only by its impact on the individual and their family. Indeed, the morbidity after a stroke is far greater than that associated with myocardial infarction. The costs per year in caring for a stroke victim are large, preventive measures for diseases such as strokes need to be targeted to those at risk.Stoke occurs in all races. Its occurrence and development are results of interaction between environmental and genetic factors. Many traditional cardiovascular risk factors have been associated with stroke, including older age, black race, hypertension, diabetes mellitus, hypercholesterolemia, and cigarette smoking. However, despite extensive investigations the etiology of stroke remains unclear in about 40% of patients, although some of the events may be explained in terms of structural abnormalities of the cerebral vasculature. Conversely, although hypertension is the biggest cause of cerebral infarction, only a small number of hypertensives eventually experience a stroke. There is an increasing body of evidence from human epidemiological, twin and animal studies suggesting a genetic contribution to stroke onset. Recent advances in molecular molecular biology have helped enormously our understanding of the mechanism of this disease at the DNA level. However, few genetic risk factors for ischeamic stroke have been established. The purpose of this study is to investigate candidate genetic markers for predisposition to cerebrovascular disease in Chinese people, and to evaluate the genetic linkage to ischaemic stroke.We performed an association study (ie. a case-control study) and genotyped up to 17 polymorphisms or mutations within 11 genes, selected from thrombosis, inflammation and leukocyte adhesion. The candidate genes were FOB, FII, FV, FII, PAI-1, GPIa, GPIIIa, ELAM, ICAM-1, TNFα and TNFβ, and the polymorphisms or mutations of these related genes were studied by molecular...