Study design: Meta-analysis to collect all eligible studies for investigating whether cartilage intermediate layer protein (CILP) gene rs2073711 polymorphism is associated with susceptibility to intervertebral disc degeneration (IVD).
Objective: To investigate the association between CILP gene rs2073711 and IVD.
Summary of background data: CILP is one of the limited genes that is being suggested to be associated with IVD. However, previous association study results of CILP and IVD are conflicted.
Methods: The PubMed, ISI Web of Science, Science Direct Online, and China National Knowledge Infrastructure database were searched for relevant articles till November 1, 2015. The odds ratio (OR) and related 95% confidence interval (CI) were drawn out and merged to assess the strength of association by STATA version 12.0.
Results: A total of 1551 IVD cases and 1793 controls from the 5 studies were used in this study, comprising four Asian populations and two European populations. Meta-analysis found that the CILP 2073711 polymorphism was significantly associated with IVD risk. The estimated OR of risk allele T of rs2073711 was 1.36. (95% CI = 1.18-1.55, P < 0.001). No significant heterogeneity and publication bias were observed in this study.
Conclusion: Our results confirm the positive association between CILP and IVD, providing novel clues for clarifying the role of CILP in the development of IVD.
Level of evidence: 2.