Data from: Risky behaviors and Parkinson's disease: a Mendelian randomization study

Objective: To examine causal associations between risky behavior phenotypes on Parkinson's disease using a Mendelian randomization approach. Methods: We used two-sample Mendelian randomization to generate unconfounded estimates using summary statistics from two independent, large meta-analyses of genome-wide association studies on risk taking behaviors (n=370,771-939,908) and Parkinson's disease (cases: n=9581, controls: n = 33,245). We used inverse variance weighted as the main method for judging causality. Results: Our results support a strong protective association between the tendency to smoke and Parkinson's disease (OR=0.714 per log odds of ever smoking; 95% CI=0.568-0.897; p-value=0.0041; Cochran Q test; p-value=0.238; I2 index=6.3%). Furthermore, we observed risk association trends between automobile speed propensity as well as the number of sexual partners and Parkinson's disease after removal of overlapping loci with other risky traits (OR=1.986 for each standard deviation increase in normalized automobile speed propensity; 95% CI=1.215-3.243; p-value=0.0066, OR=1.635 for each standard deviation increase in number of sexual partners; 95% CI=1.165-2.293; p-value=0.0049). Conclusion: These findings provide support for a causal relationship between general risk tolerance and Parkinson's disease and may provide new insights in the pathogenic mechanisms leading to the development of Parkinson's disease.Supplementary tableList of summary estimates used for the calculation of effect estimates for the primary MR analysisMR_PM_R01_D01_20190308_Neurology_SupplTable.docxe-MethodsA short introduction to Mendelian randomizationMR_PM_R01_eMethods.doc