• Eileen H Wang, Chen-Jee Hong, Heng-Liang Yeh, Ying-Jay Liou, Albert C Yang, Mu-En Liu, and Shih-Jen Tsai.
• Department of Psychiatry, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
• Neurosci. Lett. 2013 Nov 27; 556: 69-72.

AbstractInflammatory process is considered to be a pathway that results in neurodegeneration, and numerous plasma cytokines have been examined for their association with cognitive function and depression. Interleukin-1 alpha (IL-1A) genetic polymorphism (rs1800587) has been found to be associated with Alzheimer's disease susceptibility. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of IL-1A rs1800587 genetic effects on cognitive functions, loneliness and depression severity in elderly males without dementia or major depression. 192 non-demented Chinese elderly male were recruited and underwent Cognitive Abilities Screening Instrument (CASI), Wechsler Digit Span Task, Geriatric Depression Scale-short form, and UCLA Loneliness Scale assessment. IL-1A rs1800587 is a C to T transition at position -889. Compared to the C/C carriers, the T allele carriers had significantly overall higher CASI score (p=0.017) after using age and total education years as co-variates. This was especially true in the four distinct domains of long-term memory (p<0.001), orientation (p=0.017), visual construction (p=0.003), and list-generating fluency (p=0.020). This polymorphism is not associated with Geriatric Depression Scale-short form or UCLA Loneliness Scale. Our data supports that the T allele of IL-1A rs1800587 genetic polymorphism is associated with better cognitive function in the elderly. Further research will be needed to better understand the molecular mechanism for IL-1A genetic effects on cognitive function in the elderly.Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

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