1. OCCUPATION, APOLIPOPROTEIN E EPSILON2 ALLELE AND PARKINSON'S DISEASE RISK IN ISRAEL Peretz C 1, Bar-Shira A 2,4, Orr-Urtreger A 2,4, Giladi N 3,5,Peretz C 1, Bar-Shira A 2,4, Orr-Urtreger A 2,4, Giladi N 3,5 1 Department of Epidemiology, 2 Department of Genetics, 3 Department of Neurology- Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University, 4 Deprtment of Genetics, 5 Department of Neurology- Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center, Israel INTRODUCTION Parkinson's disease (PD) is currently considered as a multi-factorial disease resulting from the effect of genetic and environmental interaction. Studies have shown a moderate association between PD and farming as an occupation or exposure to pesticides. The role of Apolipoprotein E (APOE) polymorphism as a risk marker for PD is not clear. Therefore, we aimed to investigate, the relationship between APOE and farming as an occupation and the risk to develop PD RESULTS Occupational history: For each subject, in each study-group, we assessed 1-3 main occupations (based on the I-SIC classification) in which he worked at least 5 years. Table 1 presents comparison between the 3 groups on 3 selected occupations. Agriculture/Farming - males A significant difference between cases and controls-spouse (p<.05) No significant difference between cases and controls OA Industry-males No significant difference between cases and controls-spouse No significant difference between cases and controls-OA Education-females No significant difference between cases and controls-spouse No significant difference between cases and controls-OA RESULTS (cont.) Genetics: Comparison between the 3 groups, on APOE variants, is presented in table 2,and on APOE alleles in figure 1 A Gender effect was found accounting for study groups APOE variants/genotyping (accounting for gender): No significant difference between cases and controls-spouse A borderline difference between cases and controls-OA (p=.0803) E2 carriers (accounting for gender) : No significant difference between cases and controls-spouse (OR=.52, p=.1306) A significant difference between cases and controls-OA (OR=.43, p=.0259) E3,E4 carriers (accounting for gender): No significant difference between cases and controls-spouse No significant difference between cases and controls-OA CONCLUSIONS  Carrying the APOE-E2 haplotype may decrease ↓ the risk for PD  Farming as an occupation may increase ↑ the risk for PD.  However, the interaction between APOE haplotypes and occupation should further be investigated due to insufficient power of this case- controls (1:2) study METHODS Design and study population: A case-controls (1:2) study on 150 patients with PD from Tel Aviv Medical Center, non-demented aged 50- 75 (cases), 150 spouses (first control group-controls spouse) and 150 patients with osteoarthritis (OA) (second control group-controls OA). Questionnaire: The subjects were interviewed to a structured questionnaires on job history, specific exposures and background variables. Tests: APOE genotype was diagnosed from either blood or saliva which were taken from all participants Alleles: E2, E3, E4 Genotyping:E2/E2, E2/E3, E2/E4, E3/E3,E3/E4, E4/E4 Statistical Analysis: Logistic regressionsCasesControl-spousesControl-OAMFMFMF n1004232743980 E2/E20.00.00.00.00.01.3 E2/E310.04.818.89.520.515.0 E2/E44.00.03.11.40.03.8 E3/E370.073.868.867.671.865.0 E3/E415.021.49.421.67.715.0 E4/E41.00.00.00.00.00.0 100%100%100%100%100%100% Table 1: Selected occupations (%) in the 3 study groups, by gender Figure 1: Carriers of APOE allels E2,E3,E4 (%) in the 3 study groups, by gender Table 2: APOE variants (%), in the 3 study groups, by gender Interaction Genetics*farming: non significantCasesControls-spouseControls-OAMFMFMF Agriculture/farming18.04.49.32.815.14.7 Industry39.64.432.69.232.318.8 Education10.844.47.056.016.139.1