Association Between Lipid Levels and Risk for Different Types of Aneurysms: A Mendelian Randomization Study

Overview

Journal J Pers Med

Date 2021 Nov 27

PMID 34834523

Citations 8

Authors

Yanghui Chen

Man Huang

Yunling Xuan

Ke Li

Xin Xu

Linlin Wang

Yang Sun

Lei Xiao

Ping Xu

Wei Kong

Dao Wen Wang

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Background: Although the associations between serum lipid levels and aneurysms have been investigated in epidemiological studies, causality remains unknown. Thus, this study aimed to investigate the causal relationships of serum high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), total cholesterol (TC), and triglyceride (TG) levels on five types of aneurysms, using genetic variants associated with four lipid traits as instrumental variables in a Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis.

Methods: We performed two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) analyses to evaluate the associations of HDL-C, LDL-C, TC, and TG levels with risks for five types of aneurysms and those of LDL-C- (, , , , and ) and TG-lowering targets ( and ) with aneurysms.

Results: The sample sizes of the included studies ranged from nearly 80,000 to 410,000. We found inverse associations between genetically predicted HDL-C levels and aortic (OR = 0.74, 95% CI = 0.65-0.85) and abdominal aortic aneurysms (0.58, 0.45-0.75). A 1-SD increase in LDL-C and TC levels was associated with increased risks for aortic (1.41, 1.26-1.58 and 1.36, 1.18-1.56, respectively) and abdominal aortic aneurysms (1.82, 1.48-2.22 and 1.55, 1.25-1.93, respectively). TG levels were significantly associated with aortic (1.36, 1.18-1.56) and lower extremity artery aneurysms (2.76, 1.48-5.14), but limited to cerebral aneurysm (1.23, 1.06-1.42). Secondary analyses revealed a relationship between genetically proxied LDL-C-lowering targets and all types of aneurysms; however, the drug targets remained heterogeneous. We found a weak association between TG-lowering therapies and aortic (, 0.51, 0.29-0.89) and abdominal aortic aneurysms (, 0.64, 0.44-0.94).

Conclusion: According to genetic evidence, lipid dysfunction is a causal risk factor for aneurysms. Lipid-lowering drugs may be a potential effective strategy in preventing and managing aneurysms.

Citing Articles

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