Association of Polymorphism in Growth and Differentiation Factor 5 Gene with Osteoarthritis Knee

The present study investigated to identify the association of polymorphism in GDF-5 gene with osteoarthritis in North Indian population. In a case-control study, 300 cases with knee osteoarthritis and an equal number of age and gender matched healthy controls were included. Cases were diagnosed using the ACR Guidelines of Knee Osteoarthritis (KOA). Clinical symptoms were assessed with the knee specific WOMAC index and VAS for knee pain. The severity of disease was determined by radiological KL grades (Kellgren Lawren). The variant genotype of GDF-5 was found to be present at significantly higher frequency in cases than in controls, resulting in about 1.79 fold increase in risk to OA. Genotype distributions of the GDF-5 also showed significant association of variant allele with clinical score of OA patients. An association between the+104T/C GDF5 polymorphism with knee OA and clinical symptom of OA in Indian population further demonstrate a strong genetic influence of this SNP in KOA.