Acute anterior uveitis and HLA-B27

Abstract

All studies among acute anterior uveitis patients (AAU) agree on the importance of and high association with HLA-B27. However, the majority of the HLA-B27+ population will never develop AAU. The partial association of AAU and HLA-B27 is probably not based on a preferential association with a particular B27 subtype, since the HLA-B27 subtypes are equally distributed among normal controls and AAU patients. Therefore, other factors increase the susceptibility to HLA-B27 associated diseases. Family investigations among the relatives of AAU and AS patients suggest the existence of other pathogenic genetic factors in addition to HLA-B27. Due to extensive research, associations with other genes on chromosome 6 could almost be excluded and associations with genes on other chromosomes were not yet found. The only reproducible association between AAU and any genes or gene products is, at the moment, still the association with HLA-B27. However, its role, which most probably is functional, is far from clear.