Objective：The purpose of this study was to explore the causal relationship between nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) and the risk of erectile dysfunction (ED) by using two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis.
Methods: Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were screened as instrumental variables (IVs) using the public genome-wide association study summary data set (GWAS). Univariate MR, bidirectional MR and multivariate MR methods were used to analyze the causal relationship between NAFLD and ED.
Results: IVW results showed that NAFLD was not associated with ED (OR=0.991 2, 95%CI: 0.955 2－1.0286, P=0.640 6). The results of reverse MR showed that there was no correlation between ED and NAFLD (OR=1.181 5, 95%CI: 0.820 8－1.7007, P=0.369 5). Multivariate MR results showed that there was still no causal relationship between the two diseases after adjusting for confounding factors.
Conclusion: The results showed that there was no causal relationship between NAFLD and the risk of ED.
Keywords: erectile dysfunction; nonalcoholic fatty liver disease; Mendelian randomization; causal relationship.