Background: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is one of the most common types of arrhythmia in humans. Recently, many studies have investigated the relationship between human atrial fibrillation and the single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) of rs1805127 (A>G) in KCNE1 gene, but the results were still inconsistent and inconclusive.
Method: Electronic databases and bibliographies of retrieved studies were searched. We performed a meta-analysis of ten case-control studies, including 2099 cases and 2252 controls, to evaluate the association of rs1805127 polymorphism (A>G) with the risk of AF. Random-effects model was used when the heterogeneity was obvious; otherwise, fixed-effects model was applied. Meta-regression was performed to examine potential source of heterogeneity. Egger's test and Begg's test were used to detect publication biases.
Results: The results showed a significantly increased risk of AF in homozygote comparison (GG vs. AA:OR = 1.899, 95%CI: 1.568, 2.300; Pheterogeneity = 0.217), heterozygote comparison (GA vs. AA:OR = 1.436, 95% CI:1.190, 1.732; Pheterogeneity = 0.739), dominant model(GA /GG vs. AA: OR = 1.624, 95%CI: 1.361, 1.938; Pheterogeneity = 0.778) and recessive model (GG vs. GA/AA: OR = 1.394, 95%CI:1.152, 1.686; Pheterogeneity = 0.03). Meta-regression revealed that the sample size and the types of AF were the source of the heterogeneity.
Conclusion: The rs1805127 polymorphism (A>G) of KCNE1 is associated with an increased risk of AF, which suggests the rs1805217 polymorphism of KCNE1 gene may play an important role in the pathogenesis of AF.