association of interleukin-16 gene polymorphisms rs11556218 t/g and rs4072111 c/t with risk of breast cancer in an iranian population

Background and objectives: breast cancer is the leading cause of death in women. cytokines regulate the intensity and continuity of immune response by balancing cell-mediated immunity and humoral responses. this study aimed to investigate the relationship between two polymorphisms of the interleukin-16 (il-16) gene and risk of breast cancer. methods: blood samples were collected from 80 breast cancer patients and 80 healthy individuals. polymorphisms rs11556218 t/g and rs4072111 c/t were investigated by polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (rflp-pcr). then, genotype and allele frequency distributions were evaluated in each group using the spss software (version 24). results: the frequency of genotype rs11556218 differed significantly between the patients and controls (p=0.007). the tg genotype (odds ratio [or]= 2.471, 95% confidence intervals [ci]: 1.229-4.965, p= 0.001) and total tg+gg genotypes (or= 3.095, 95% ci: 1.624-5.899, p= 0.001) had a significant relationship with increased risk for breast cancer. the allele and genotype frequencies of rs4072111 c/t polymorphism did not differ significantly between the patients and controls. conclusion: our findings suggest that the rs11556218 t/g polymorphism of the il-16 gene may be associated with susceptibility to breast cancer.