Background and objective: Hypertensive disorders of pregnancy could be favoured by polymorphisms in genes affecting vascular physiology. The aim of our work was to study several variants in the genes regulating oxidative stress, plasma lipids metabolism and endothelial function (observational study).
Material and methods: We studied the -930A/G polymorphism of the CYBA gene promoter, the apolipoprotein E (APOE) genotype and the methylene-tetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR) gene C677T polymorphism in 134 healthy pregnant women, 266 pregnant with non-proteinuric hypertension (NPH) and 184 patients with preeclampsia (PE).
Results: The GG genotype of the CYBA gene promoter was present in 32.1% of the control population, 38.7% of patients with NPH (P=0.19) and 21.2% of the women with PE (P=0.03). A higher frequency of epsilon 3/epsilon 4 and epsilon 4/epsilon 4 genotypes of APOE was observed in patients with PE or NPH compared with controls (P<0.01). There were no significant differences detected in genotype or allele distribution of the MTHFR, C677T polymorphism. APOE epsilon 3/epsilon 4 and epsilon 4/epsilon 4 genotypes had a worse lipoprotein profile characterized by higher plasma values of total cholesterol (P<0.05) and triglycerides (P<0.005). Despite no differences in MTHFR C677T polymorphism distribution, higher levels of plasma homocysteine were observed in patients with PE than in patients with NPH or controls.
Conclusions: CYBA and APOE polymorphism showed a different distribution in the groups studied, while no differences were observed in MTHFR C677T polymorphism. APOE genotype was associated with changes in lipid and lipoprotein profiles in pregnant women.