Association of dopaminergic/GABAergic genes with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in children

Abstract

Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is the most commonly diagnosed neurobehavioral disorder in children and adolescents; however, its etiology is unknown. In this study, we investigated the association of five polymorphisms in dopaminergic/GABAergic genes with ADHD using polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism in a group of 54 children with ADHD and 67 healthy controls. The distribution of AA genotype and A allele frequencies of rs5320 in the dopamine beta-hydroxylase gene in ADHD children differed significantly from that in healthy controls; however, no associations were found between four other polymorphisms in dopaminergic/GABAergic genes and ADHD. We also identified the best model consisting of four loci. We conclude that the rs5320 polymorphism may be considered as a genetic risk factor of ADHD, but the other four polymorphisms were not confirmed to be related directly to ADHD. The multilocus of dopaminergic/GABAergic genes acted in combination to affect susceptibility to ADHD in the children studied.