HLA Profile and Clinical Presentation of Multiple Sclerosis in IRAN

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a demyelinating disease of the central nervous system, with unknown etiology in which both genetic and environmental factors are thought to be involved. The human leukocyte antigen (HLA) system provides a set of genetic markers which lend themselves to systematic study. In Iran, HLA-A24, HLA-DR2, and HLA- DR15 are significantly increased in MS patients. The disease also has 3 main clinical presentations, consisting of relapsingremitting (88%) primary progressive (7%) and secondary progressive with a gender ratio of 2.5:1 (female: male) and a mean age at onset of 27+ 7.4 years in our country. Five percent of our patients had a positive family history for the disease, 14% of patients had benign MS, and 12% with disease duration longer than five years had an Expanded Disability Status Scale <2. The opticospinal form of MS was not a common form of presentation of the disease in Iran.