Journal
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF EPIDEMIOLOGY
Volume 38, Issue 4, Pages 971-975Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1093/ije/dyp162
Keywords
Obesity; cancer; Mendelian randomization
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Funding
- European Commission [IC15-CT96-0313]
- National Cancer Institute R01 grant [09203901A2]
- MRC [G0600705] Funding Source: UKRI
- Medical Research Council [G0600705] Funding Source: researchfish
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Methods To avoid these biases we used a Mendelian randomization approach incorporating an analysis of variants in the FTO gene that are strongly associated with BMI levels among 7000 subjects from a study of lung, kidney and upper-aerodigestive cancer. Results The FTO A allele which is linked with increased BMI was associated with a decreased risk of lung cancer (allelic odds ratio (OR) = 0.92, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.84-1.00). It was also associated with a weak increased risk of kidney cancer, which was more apparent before the age of 50 (OR = 1.44, CI 1.09-1.90). Conclusion Our results highlight the potential for genetic variation to act as an unconfounded marker of environmentally modifiable factors, and offer the potential to obtain estimates of the causal effect of obesity. However, far larger sample sizes than studied here will be required to undertake this with precision.
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