Mendelian Randomization: Genetic Anchors for Causal Inference in Epidemiological Studies

Overview

Journal Hum Mol Genet

Specialties Genetics
Molecular Biology

Date 2014 Jul 28

PMID 25064373

Citations 1932

Authors

George Davey Smith

Gibran Hemani

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Observational epidemiological studies are prone to confounding, reverse causation and various biases and have generated findings that have proved to be unreliable indicators of the causal effects of modifiable exposures on disease outcomes. Mendelian randomization (MR) is a method that utilizes genetic variants that are robustly associated with such modifiable exposures to generate more reliable evidence regarding which interventions should produce health benefits. The approach is being widely applied, and various ways to strengthen inference given the known potential limitations of MR are now available. Developments of MR, including two-sample MR, bidirectional MR, network MR, two-step MR, factorial MR and multiphenotype MR, are outlined in this review. The integration of genetic information into population-based epidemiological studies presents translational opportunities, which capitalize on the investment in genomic discovery research.

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