Relationship between CYP2C19 polymorphisms and weight gain in epilepsy patients treated with divalproex sodium: does gender matter?

Introduction: Epilepsy is an unprovoked seizure caused by an abnormal paroxysmal neuronal release in the brain. One of epilepsy treatments is anti-epileptic drug divalproex sodium. It is often prescribed to control seizures but it increases body weight. Weight gain may decrease the effectiveness of epilepsy treatment and cause endocrine disorders. CYP2C19 polymorphism may help physicians map patients vulnerable to weight gain due to divalproex sodium. This study aimed to determine the relationship between CYP2C19 polymorphisms and the incidence of weight gain based on gender in epilepsy patients treated with divalproex sodium.   Methods: This cross-sectional study consisted of 17 male and 23 female patients. The polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) was used to identify CYP2C19 polymorphism which was grouped into: extensive metabolizer, intermediate metabolizer and poor metabolizer. The results were analyzed using Chi-squared test to determine the relationship between CYP2C19 and each variable (gender, age, epilepsy types, valproic acid types, family history of obesity and presence of weight gain) based on of gender. Results: The results showed that there was no statistically significant association between CYP2C19 polymorphisms and gender-based epilepsy patients groups (p>0.05). We found that most of the subjects in this study were women with an increase in body weight by 57.5%. There was no association of CYP2C19 polymorphism with type of divalproex sodium, dose of divalproex sodium, length of treatment, type of epilepsy and family history of obesity. Conclusion: There is no significant association between CYP2C19 polymorphism and weight gain between genders in epilepsy patients.