Latest perspectives in genetic risk factors for restless legs syndrome

Abstract

The high frequency of positive family history of restless legs syndrome (RLS) in patients with this disease and the observed high concordance rates in monozygotic compared with dizygotic twins support a major role of genetic factors in the development of RLS. Although a number of variants for several genes may increase the risk of RLS, no definitive causative genes have been identified to date. In this review, we summarise the studies performed on families with RLS, twin studies, linkage studies, genome-wide association studies, case-control association studies and exome sequencing in RLS. The strongest candidate genes are of PTPRD, BTBD9 and MEIS. © TOUCH MEDICAL MEDIA 2013.