Allelic association analysis of phospholipase A2 genes with schizophrenia.

Several studies suggest increased activity of phospholipase A2 in schizophrenic patients. In the present study, variants of four genes coding for phospholipase A2 enzyme groups (sPLA2, cPLA2, iPLA2 and PAFAH) were analysed in a case-control sample using 240 schizophrenic patients and 312 healthy controls. No difference was observed on the allelic and genotypic distribution of cPLA2 and sPLA2 gene polymorphisms among the groups. The PAFAH variant was very rare in our population and therefore not informative. A significant allelic (chi2=5.86, P=0.0085, odds ratio=1.38, 95% confidence interval, 1.08-1.77) and genotypic (chi2=5.4, P=0.02) association with the iPLA2 gene polymorphism was found. In conclusion, our data suggested that iPLA2 may play a role as a susceptibility gene for schizophrenia in our sample; however, confirmatory studies in independent samples are needed.