Evaluación de la respuesta al tratamiento de asma en niños y adolescentes de 5 a 17 años en la ciudad de Cuenca-Ecuador, mediante el análisis del polimorfismo IL-10 rs3024496

Abstract

Asthma is a common chronic respiratory disease in childhood, this condition can impact on the patient's quality of life in many negative ways. It is estimated that the prevalence of asthma in the city of Cuenca is 17.8% and of this percentage 90.3% of patients do not respond to treatment. There may be genetic variables that interfere with therapeutic failure, including cytokine-related polymorphisms. IL-10 protein is an anti-inflammatory immunoregulatory cytokine, so variations in the sequence of the gene (polymorphism) encoding this protein could lead to a loss or reduction in the functionality of this cytokine leading to treatment failure in asthmatic patients. In this study, we evaluated the clinical significance of the IL-10 gene polymorphism (rs3024496) and its relationship with the response to asthma treatment in children and adolescents aged 5-17 years in Cuenca Ecuador. This study is part of the project "Factors associated with asthma attack recurrence (ATTACK) in children from three Ecuadorian cities during COVID-19" and therefore the samples to be analysed come from participants diagnosed with asthma recruited for the aforementioned study. The extraction of the genetic material was performed from blood samples using the Gentra® Puregene® Blood Kit (Qiagen) and subsequently the performance was checked with DNA quantification by a fluorescence method (Qubit 3). The genotyping assay for the IL-10 rs 3024496 polymorphism was performed using Taqman probes. Patients were classified into two groups (controlled and uncontrolled asthma) based on the clinical data obtained. Subsequently, T-test and Chi-square statistical analysis was performed for symmetrical variables, Wilcoxon test for asymmetrical variables and SNP association in order to establish relationships between observed genotype and treatment response. The results obtained showed a significant difference between the polymorphic genotype, applied for a recessive model, and the lack of response to treatment based on the number of visits for exacerbations in the last year. We conclude that the presence of the polymorphism in the IL-10 gene is related to the likelihood of patient non-response to treatment, however, further studies regarding this polymorphism are still needed.