Causal association between peripheral immune cells and IgA nephropathy: a Mendelian randomization study

TL;DR

This study finds that high lymphocyte counts are a causal risk factor for IgA nephropathy, using genetic data to support a direct link.

Contribution

The study provides causal evidence linking peripheral immune cell counts, particularly lymphocytes, to IgA nephropathy risk using Mendelian randomization.

Findings

Genetically predicted higher lymphocyte counts are associated with increased IgAN risk (OR 1.43).

Adjusting for CRP levels confirmed the causal effect of lymphocytes on IgAN (OR 1.44).

CD3 expression in T cell subsets showed a consistent positive correlation with IgAN.

Abstract

The relationship between peripheral immune cells and immunoglobulin A nephropathy (IgAN) is widely known; however, causal evidence of this link is lacking. Here, we aimed to determine the causal effect of peripheral immune cells, specifically total white blood cells, lymphocytes, monocytes, basophils, eosinophils, and neutrophils, as well as lymphocyte subset traits, on the IgAN risk using a Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis.

The inverse-variance weighted (IVW) method was used for the primary analysis. We applied three complementary methods, including the weighted median, MR-Egger regression, and MR-PRESSO, to detect and correct for the effect of horizontal pleiotropy. Additionally, we performed a multivariable MR (MVMR) analysis, adjusting for the effects of C-reactive protein (CRP) levels. The roles of specific lymphocyte subtypes and their significance have garnered interest. Bidirectional two-sample MR analysis was performed to test the potential causal relationships between immune traits, including median fluorescence intensities (MFIs) and the relative cell count (AC), and IgAN.

The IVW-MR analysis suggested a potential causal relationship between lymphocyte counts and IgAN in Europe (OR per 1-SD increase: 1.43, 95% CI: 1.08–1.88, P = 0.0123). The risk effect of lymphocytes remained even after adjusting for CRP levels using the MVMR method (OR per 1-SD increase: 1.44, 95% CI: 1.05–1.96, P = 0.0210). The other sensitivity analyses showed a consistent trend. The largest GWAS published to date was used for peripheral blood immunophenotyping to explore the potential causal relationship between peripheral immune cell subsets and IgAN. Six AC–IgAN and 14 MFI–IgAN pairs that reached statistical significance (P < 0.05) were detected. Notably, CD3, expressed in eight subsets of T cells, consistently showed a positive correlation with IgAN. The bidirectional MR analysis did not reveal any evidence of reverse causality. According to the sensitivity analysis, horizontal pleiotropy was unlikely to distort the causal estimates.

Genetically determined high lymphocyte counts were associated with IgAN, supporting that high lymphocyte counts is causal risk factor for IgAN.

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