Relationship between lipids and sleep apnea: Mendelian randomization analysis

Abstract

Background: Lipids increase the risk of sleep apnea; however, the causality between them is still inconclusive.

Aim: To explore the causal relationship between serum lipids and sleep apnea using two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis.

Methods: Single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) data related to serum lipids were obtained from the Global Lipids Genetics Consortium study, which included 188578 individuals of European ancestry. Additionally, sleep apnea-related SNP data were collected from the United Kingdom Biobank study, which comprised 463005 individuals of European ancestry. Two-sample MR analysis was performed to assess the causality between serum lipids and sleep apnea based on the above public data.

Results: Genetically predicted low-density lipoprotein (odds ratio [OR] = 0.99, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.99 to 1.00; P = 0.58), high-density lipoprotein (OR = 0.99, 95%CI = 0.99 to 1.00; P = 0.91), triglyceride (OR = 1.00, 95%CI = 0.99 to 1.00; P = 0.92), and total cholesterol (OR = 0.99, 95%CI = 0.99 to 1.00; P = 0.33) were causally unrelated to sleep apnea.

Conclusion: Our MR analysis suggests that genetically predicted serum lipids are not risk factors of sleep apnea.

Keywords: Lipid; Mendelian randomization; Risk factor; Single nucleotide polymorphism; Sleep apnea.