Studies were included in this meta-analysis if they met all of the following criteria: 1) evaluation of the association between TLR9 -1237T/C polymorphism and the risk of IBDs; 2) a casecontrol design; 3) genotype distribution availability in cases and controls; and 4) consistency of the genotype distributions in the controls with Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium (HWE). Studies were excluded if they met any one of the following criteria: 1) genotype or allele frequencies could not be obtained; 2) duplicated **data** were used; or 3) **data** were only presented in reviews, case-reports, or abstracts.