Affiliations: Department of Internal Medicine, Division Respiratory
and Critical Care Medicine, Philipps-University of Marburg, 35043 Marburg,
Germany | Departments of Cellular and Molecular Physiology, and
Pediatrics, Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, P.O. Box 850,
500 University Dr., Hershey, PA 17033, USA
Abstract: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a major health
problem. Genetic factors that contribute to the disease have been postulated.
The pulmonary surfactant protein B (SP-B), which is essential for normal lung
function, is considered as a candidate gene for COPD in this case-control
study. We studied the SP-B intron 4 size variants in 346 individuals. This
group consisted of 118 patients with chronic bronchitis or COPD, including 24
patients with acute respiratory failure (ARF) in COPD, 118 matched controls
without pulmonary disease and 110 healthy individuals (population control). The
frequency of intron 4 variants was similar in either control group (10.9%,
respectively), with a small increase in the COPD group (18.6%) increase was due
to a high increase of intron 4 variants in the ARF subgroup (37.5%, indicate
that SP-B intron 4 variants may associate with increased risk of ARF in COPD
and may be used as a marker of susceptibility in this disease subgroup.
