Candidate genes for temporal lobe epilepsy: a replication study

The objective of this study is to replicate previously published results regarding the involvement of several susceptibility genes in temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE): interleukin 1 beta (IL-1 beta), interleukin 1 beta (IL-1 alpha), interleukin 1RA (IL-1RA), apolipoprotein E (ApoE) and prodynorphin (PDYN). We used a case-control approach comparing several polymorphisms within these candidate genes between unrelated TLE patients and matched controls. We were thus able to confirm the role of ApoE, IL-1 alpha and IL-1RA genes in TLE disease, but failed to confirm the involvement of IL-1 beta and PDYN. This failure should be interpreted with caution, as this may be due to the small size of our study groups and the resultant lack of statistical power.