Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms Of Interleukin-18 Gene And Risk Of Breast Cancer In Han Chinese Population

Interleukin-18 (IL-18) is one of the immunomodulatory cytokines that plays an important role in cellular functions against tumor development and progression. IL-18 (-607) G/T and (-137) G/C gene promoter polymorphisms and their haplotypes variants are associated with risk of various cancers. We evaluated a possible association of IL-18 (-607) G/T and (-137) G/C gene promoter polymorphisms with breast cancer or benign breast disease susceptibility in Han Chinese female patient. A total number of 142 patients with breast cancer,86 patients with benign breast disease and 160 healthy controls were genotyped for the IL-18 (-607) G/T and (-137) G/C polymorphism. Genotype frequencies were evaluated by chi-square test and logistic regression models。 IL-18 (-137) GG genotype was significantly associated with the risk of breast cancer and benign breast disease as compared to healthy controls(0.030å'Œ0.0036).There were interactions between genotype and menopause,BMI;The allele frequencies of the IL-18 promoter-607 C/A and-137 G/C polymorphism in patients were not significantly different than that in healthy controls (p>0.05). Our results suggest that IL-18 (-137) G/C, (-607) G/T polymorphism are significantly associated with the susceptibility of breast cancer, and haplotype -607T/-137C are related with lymph node metastasis.