The effect of survival bias on case-control genetic association studies of highly lethal diseases.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Survival bias is the phenomenon by which individuals are excluded from analysis of a trait because of mortality related to the expression of that trait. In genetic association studies, variants increasing risk for disease onset as well as risk of disease-related mortality (lethality) could be difficult to detect in genetic association case-control designs, possibly leading to underestimation of a variant's effect on disease risk.

Methods and results

We modeled cohorts for 3 diseases of high lethality (intracerebral hemorrhage, ischemic stroke, and myocardial infarction) using existing longitudinal data. Based on these models, we simulated case-control genetic association studies for genetic risk factors of varying effect sizes, lethality, and minor allele frequenc

SUBMITTER: Anderson CD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3080449 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature