A Guide to Understanding Mendelian Randomization Studies.

ABSTRACT: Epidemiology provides a powerful framework for characterizing exposure-disease relationships, but its utility for making causal inferences is limited because epidemiologic data are observational in nature and subject to biases stemming from undetected confounding variables and reverse causation. Mendelian randomization (MR) is an increasingly popular method used to circumvent these limitations. MR uses genetic variants, or instruments, as a natural experiment to proxy an exposure, thus allowing estimation of causal effects upon an outcome that are minimally affected by the usual biases present in epidemiologic studies. Notably, MR relies on three core assumptions related to the selection of the genetic instruments, and adherence to these assumptions must be carefully evaluated to assess th

SUBMITTER: Nguyen K 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11833605 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature