Unveiling the shared genetic architecture between testosterone and polycystic ovary syndrome.

Testosterone (T) is a critical predictor of polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) but the genetic overlap between T and PCOS has not been established. Here by leveraging genetic datasets from large-scale genome-wide association studies, we assessed the genetic correlation and polygenic overlap between PCOS and three T-related traits using linkage disequilibrium score regression and the bivariate causal mixture model methods. The conjunctional false discovery rate (conjFDR) method was employed to identify shared causal variants.

Sleep fragmentation and the risk of obesity: The Sleep Heart Health Study.

Objective: Sleep disturbances have been recognized as a risk factor for obesity. This study used polysomnography records to investigate associations between sleep fragmentation and obesity.

Methods: Objectively measured sleep fragmentation data recorded by in-home polysomnography, including total arousal index (ArI-total), ArI in rapid eye movement (REM) sleep (ArI-REM), ArI in non-REM sleep (ArI-NREM), sleep fragmentation index, sleep efficiency (SE), and wake after sleep onset (WASO), were based on the Sleep Heart Health Study (2,835 men and 2,888 women with a mean [SD] age of 63.

Mendelian randomization analysis of the association between human blood cell traits and uterine polyps.

Human blood cells (HBCs) play essential roles in multiple biological processes but their roles in development of uterine polyps are unknown. Here we implemented a Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis to investigate the effects of 36 HBC traits on endometrial polyps (EPs) and cervical polyps (CPs). The random-effect inverse-variance weighted method was adopted as standard MR analysis and three additional MR methods (MR-Egger, weighted median, and MR-PRESSO) were used for sensitivity analyses.

Causal Effects of Genetically Determined Metabolites on Risk of Polycystic Ovary Syndrome: A Mendelian Randomization Study.

Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) is a heterogeneous endocrine disorder that is influenced by both genetic and environmental factors. However, the etiology of PCOS remains unclear. We conducted a two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis to assess the causal effects of genetically determined metabolites (GDMs) on the risk of PCOS.

Targeted hepatitis E vaccination for women of childbearing age is cost-effective in China.

Background: Hepatitis E virus (HEV) infection is hyper-endemic in China, it is characterized with a high morbidity of fulminant hepatitis and mortality in pregnant women. The first hepatitis E vaccine, HEV 239, was licensed in China in 2011 which provides an effective preventive measure.

Objective: To evaluate the cost-effectiveness of vaccination with HEV 239 in women of childbearing age in China and whether HEV antibody screening should be considered before vaccination.

Relative Contributions of Different Lifestyle Factors to Health-Related Quality of Life in the Elderly.

Much of the previous literature has studied the relationship between individual lifestyle factors and the health-related quality of life (HRQOL). However, only a few studies combined them to explore their relative importance to the HRQOL in the elderly. This study assesses the HRQOL of the urban, rural, and institutionalized Chinese elderly and explores the relative contributions of different lifestyle factors to their HRQOL.

Effect of lutein supplementation on visual function in nonproliferative diabetic retinopathy.

Background And Objectives: The purpose of this study was to determine whether supplementation with lutein improved visual function in patients with nonproliferative diabetic retinopathy (NPDR).

Methods And Study Design: In this randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial, 31 patients with NPDR were assigned randomly to 10 mg/d of lutein or identical placebo for 36 weeks. Visual performance indices, including visual acuity (VA), contrast sensitivity (CS) and glare sensitivity (GS) at four different spatial frequencies, were measured at baseline, week 18 and 36.