Single-nucleotide polymorphisms of VEGF-A and VEGFR-2 genes and risk of infantile hemangioma.

BACKGROUND: Infantile hemangioma (IH) is the most common vascular tumor of childhood and infancy. It is distinguished by rapid proliferation of endothelial cells during the first year of life followed by spontaneous regression thereafter. One of the possible factors responsible for the IH development is vascular endothelial grow factor (VEGF). The purpose of this study was to evaluate the influence of selected polymorphisms in the genes coding for VEGF-A (+405 G/C, rs2010963; +936 C/T, rs3025039) and its receptor VEGFR-2 (+1416 T/A, rs1870377; -271 G/A, rs7667298) on the susceptibility to infantile hemangioma.

METHODS: We performed a case-control study of 99 Polish children hospitalized due to IH and compared them with matched healthy control subjects. The polymorphisms were ascertained through genotyping by PCR-RFLP assay, PCR-HRM, or the allelic discrimination method.

RESULTS: The study revealed a lower odds of infantile hemangioma in individuals with GG genotype or G allele for +405 G/C VEGF-A polymorphism (ORdis = 0.52, P = 0.023 and ORdis  = 0.63, P = 0.025, respectively). No association was observed for the remaining VEGF and VEGFR-2 polymorphisms and IH risk.

CONCLUSIONS: In our study, none of the investigated VEGF-A and VEGFR-2 genes polymorphisms was found to be an independent prognostic marker for infantile hemangioma. However, there is evidence that individuals carrying at least one G allele of +405 G/C VEGF-A polymorphism have significantly lower risk of IH.