Abstract
BACKGROUND: The innate immune system against malignancies is mainly orchestrated by natural killer cells, which carry out killing mechanisms by using their receptors, such as killer immunoglobulin-like receptors (KIRs). This study was designed to determine the diversity of KIR genes in non-melanoma skin cancers. METHODS: A total of 160 subjects with skin cancer, including 60 cases of squamous cell carcinoma and 100 cases of basal cell carcinoma (BCC), and 270 healthy subjects formed the study groups. The sequence-specific polymerase chain reaction was carried out to detect the presence or absence of 16 KIR genes. RESULTS: KIR3DL1 (p = 0.0381, OR = 4.78, 95% CI = 1.108 to 20.62) increased in BCC patients compared to healthy controls. CONCLUSION: We concluded that the higher frequency of KIR3DL1 in BCC patients compared with healthy controls may increase the probability of developing BCC in Iranians.