The first USH2A mutation analysis of Japanese autosomal recessive retinitis pigmentosa patients: a totally different mutation profile with the lack of frequent mutations found in Caucasian patients.

Retinitis pigmentosa (RP) is a highly heterogeneous genetic disease. The USH2A gene, which accounts for approximately 74-90% of Usher syndrome type 2 (USH2) cases, is also one of the major autosomal recessive RP (arRP) causative genes among Caucasian populations. To identify disease-causing USH2A gene mutations in Japanese RP patients, all 73 exons were screened for mutations by direct sequencing. In total, 100 unrelated Japanese RP patients with no systemic manifestations were identified, excluding families with obvious autosomal dominant inheritance. Of these 100 patients, 82 were included in this present study after 18 RP patients with very likely pathogenic EYS (eyes shut homolog) mutations were excluded. The mutation analysis of the USH2A revealed five very likely pathogenic mutations in four patients. A patient had only one very likely pathogenic mutation and the others had two of them. Caucasian frequent mutations p.C759F in arRP and p.E767fs in USH2 were not found. All the four patients exhibited typical clinical features of RP. The observed prevalence of USH2A gene mutations was approximately 4% among Japanese arRP patients, and the profile of the USH2A gene mutations differed largely between Japanese patients and previously reported Caucasian populations.