The common variant of rs6214 in insulin like growth factor 1 ( IGF1 ) gene: a potential protective factor for non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.

Purpose: Regarding the central role of insulin resistance in NAFLD, we explored whether insulin-like growth factor 1 ( IGF1 ) and insulin-like growth factor-binding protein 3 ( IGFBP3 ) gene variants were associated with NAFLD susceptibility.
Methods: IGF1 (rs6214) and IGFBP3 (rs3110697) gene variants were genotyped in 154 cases with biopsy-proven NAFLD and 156 controls using PCR-RFLP method.
Results: The IGF1 rs6214 "AA + AG" genotype compared with the "GG" genotype appeared to be a marker of decreased NAFLD susceptibility ( p  = .006; OR = 0.47, 95%CI = 0.28-0.80). Furthermore, the IGF1 rs6214 "A" allele was underrepresented in the cases than controls ( p  = .024; OR = 0.61, 95%CI = 0.40-0.94). However, we observed no significant difference in genotype or allele frequencies between the cases and controls for IGFBP3 gene.
Conclusions: To our knowledge, these findings suggest, for the first time, that the IGF1 rs6214 "A" allele and "AA + AG" genotype have protective effects for NAFLD susceptibility. Nonetheless, further studies are needed to validate our findings.