BACKGROUNDType 1 diabetes (T1D) is a multifactorial disease. This article aims to evaluate the relationship between allele polymorphism of HLA-DQ, DR and T1D in the Chinese population.

METHODSThe odds ratios (ORs) of HLA-DQ, DR allele distributions in patients with T1D were analyzed against healthy controls. All the relevant studies in Pubmed and CNKI were identified, and poor qualified studies were excluded. The meta-analysis software REVMAN 4.2 was applied for investigating heterogeneity among individual studies and for summarizing all the studies. The publication bias were also evaluated.

RESULTSDQA1*0301, DQA1*0501, DQB1*0201, DQB1*0302 were the susceptible alleles (all P < 0.05) in the Chinese population, their merger ORs 2.40, 3.15, 3.66, and 2.67 respectively. DQA1*0103, DQA1*0201, DQA1*0401, DQB1*0301, DQB1*0402, DQB1*0501, DQB1*0503, DQB1*0601 and DQB1*0602 were the protective alleles (P < 0.05), their merger ORs were 0.11, 0.45, 0.30, 0.38, 0.23, 0.37, 0.25, 0.48, and 0.30 respectively. In serum level, DR3, DR4, DR9 alleles were the susceptible alleles (all P < 0.05) and their merger ORs were 5.58, 1.53, 1.66, 29.78, and 6.65 respectively. HLA-DR2, DR5, and DR7 alleles were the protective alleles (all P < 0.05) and their merger ORs were 0.39, 0.51, and 0.50. In genetic type level, DRB1*04, DRB1*0301, DRB1*0901 were the susceptible alleles (all P < 0.05) and their merger ORs were 2.19, 6.43, 1.31, 3.83, and 8.08. DRB1*07, DRB1*08, DRB1*12, DRB1*13, DRB1*14, DRB1*16, DRB1*0406 alleles were the protective alleles (all P < 0.05) and their merger ORs were 0.44, 0.27, 0.45, 0.13, 0.19, 0.40, and 0.27 respectively.

CONCLUSIONSIn the Chinese population, some HLA-DQ, DR alleles are relevant to T1D which are not totally the same as non-Chinese populations.