PREECLAMPSIA IS ASSOCIATED WITH HLA-DR4 SHARING BETWEEN MOTHER AND FETUS

Abstract: Full HLA‐A,B and DR typing was carried out on 92 women with proteinuric pre‐eclampsia, 80 of their husbands and 46 of their babies. The results were compared with corresponding data from 65 normotensive pregnancies involving primiparous women. The frequency of HLA‐DR4 was increased in the pre‐eclamptic women (RR 3.1; p< 0.005) and in the babies of pre‐eclamptic pregnancies (RR 2.6; p < 0.03). The strongest association, however, was with sharing of HLA‐DR4 between mother and fetus (RR 4.2; p = 0.01). There was no increase in HLA antigen sharing in general between spouses or maternal‐fetal pairs in pre‐eclampsia. Nor did pre‐eclamptic women exhibit increased homozygosity in general at any HLA locus. We conclude that genetic susceptibility to pre‐eclampsia depends at least partly on fetomaternal compatibility for a gene or genes associated with HLA‐DR4. Copyright © 1990, Wiley Blackwell. All rights reserved