Objectives: AS is known to be a highly heritable disease, but previous studies on the magnitude of the familial aggregation and heritability of AS have been small and inconclusive, with familial relative risks ranging from 17 to 94. We aimed to improve estimates of these factors by studying families of all subjects diagnosed with AS in Sweden over a period of 16 years and to investigate if familial risks vary by sex or type of relative.
Methods: In a nested case-control study, we identified AS index patients from the National Patient Register (NPR) and the Swedish Rheumatology Quality Register (SRQ) between 2001 and 2016. Each index patient was matched on age and sex to up to 50 general population controls. First-degree relatives of index patients and controls were identified through the Multi-Generation Register, with disease status ascertained in the NPR and SRQ. Familial risks were defined as odds ratios (ORs) of having AS when exposed to a first-degree relative with AS, using conditional logistic regression.
Results: The overall familial OR for AS was 19.4 (95% CI 18.1, 20.8). Estimates were similar for different relative types and by sex, but having more than one affected relative resulted in a higher risk [OR 68.0 (95% CI 51.3, 90.1)]. Heritability, estimated by assuming sibling risks were completely due to genetics, was 77% (95% CI 73, 80).
Conclusion: Although the familial risk and heritability of AS are higher than for most other diseases, we report estimates that are substantially lower than commonly referenced numbers for AS from other populations.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/rheumatology/kez519 | DOI Listing |
Cornea
January 2025
Department of Ophthalmology, Edith Wolfson Medical Center, Holon, Israel.
Purpose: To present 4 family members with posterior polymorphous corneal dystrophy (PPCD), nonkeratoconic steep corneas, and myopia caused by a previously unknown genetic alteration in the ZEB1 gene.
Methods: Ophthalmic examinations and corneal curvature analyses were performed for all patients. Whole-exome targeted gene panel sequencing was performed for 1 patient.
Mol Ther Nucleic Acids
March 2025
NYU Cardiovascular Research Center, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY 100016, USA.
Altered protein conformation can cause incurable neurodegenerative disorders. Mutations in , the gene encoding neuroserpin, can alter protein conformation resulting in cytotoxic aggregation leading to neuronal death. Familial encephalopathy with neuroserpin inclusion bodies (FENIB) is a rare autosomal dominant progressive myoclonic epilepsy that progresses to dementia and premature death.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFGenet Epidemiol
March 2025
Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, Laval University, Quebec City, Quebec, Canada.
A large proportion of genetic variations involved in complex diseases are rare and located within noncoding regions, making the interpretation of underlying biological mechanisms a daunting task. Although technical and methodological progress has been made to annotate the genome, current disease-rare-variant association tests incorporating such annotations suffer from two major limitations. First, they are generally restricted to case-control designs of unrelated individuals, which often require tens or hundreds of thousands of individuals to achieve sufficient power.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInt J Hyg Environ Health
January 2025
NHC Key Lab of Reproduction Regulation, Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Reproductive Health Drug and Devices, Shanghai Institute for Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Technologies, School of Public Health, Fudan University, Shanghai, 200237, China. Electronic address:
Background: Direct evidence linking ambient temperature to human fecundity is sparse. We aimed to evaluate the potential impact of ambient temperature on time to pregnancy (TTP) and identify the optimal temperature range for initiating conception attempts.
Methods: Our analysis included 576 927 couples from the Chinese National Free Preconception Health Examination Project (NFPHEP) in Yunnan Province, with a one-year follow-up post-enrollment.
J Dent Sci
January 2025
Graduate Institute of Clinical Dentistry, School of Dentistry, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.
Background/purpose: Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) is a common malignancy often associated with poor prognosis due to chemoresistance. In this study, we investigated whether arecoline, a major alkaloid in betel nuts, can stimulate aldo-keto reductase family 1 member B10 (AKR1B10) levels in OSCC, promoting cancer stemness and leading to resistance to cisplatin (CDDP)-based chemotherapy.
Materials And Methods: Gain- and Loss- of AKR1B10 functions were analyzed using WB and q-PCR of OSCC cells.
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