Ahlqvist, Viktor H;
Dardani, Christina;
Madley-Dowd, Paul;
Forbes, Harriet;
Rast, Jessica;
Zhong, Caichen;
Gardner, Renee M;
... Rai, Dheeraj; + view all
(2024)
Psychiatric comorbidities in epilepsy: population co-occurrence, genetic correlations and causal effects.
General Psychiatry
, 37
(1)
, Article e101201. 10.1136/gpsych-2023-101201.
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Abstract
Background: Psychiatric comorbidities are common in patients with epilepsy. Reasons for the co-occurrence of psychiatric conditions and epilepsy remain poorly understood. Aim: We aimed to triangulate the relationship between epilepsy and psychiatric conditions to determine the extent and possible origins of these conditions. Methods Using nationwide Swedish health registries, we quantified the lifetime prevalence of psychiatric disorders in patients with epilepsy. We then used summary data from genome-wide association studies to investigate whether the identified observational associations could be attributed to a shared underlying genetic aetiology using cross-trait linkage disequilibrium score regression. Finally, we assessed the potential bidirectional relationships using two-sample Mendelian randomisation. Results: In a cohort of 7 628 495 individuals, we found that almost half of the 94 435 individuals diagnosed with epilepsy were also diagnosed with a psychiatric condition in their lifetime (adjusted lifetime prevalence, 44.09%; 95% confidence interval (CI) 43.78% to 44.39%). We found evidence for a genetic correlation between epilepsy and some neurodevelopmental and psychiatric conditions. For example, we observed a genetic correlation between epilepsy and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (rg =0.18, 95% CI 0.09 to 0.27, p<0.001)—a correlation that was more pronounced in focal epilepsy (rg =0.23, 95% CI 0.09 to 0.36, p<0.001). Findings from Mendelian randomisation using common genetic variants did not support bidirectional effects between epilepsy and neurodevelopmental or psychiatric conditions. Conclusions: Psychiatric comorbidities are common in patients with epilepsy. Genetic correlations may partially explain some comorbidities; however, there is little evidence of a bidirectional relationship between the genetic liability of epilepsy and psychiatric conditions. These findings highlight the need to understand the role of environmental factors or rare genetic variations in the origins of psychiatric comorbidities in epilepsy.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Psychiatric comorbidities in epilepsy: population co-occurrence, genetic correlations and causal effects |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1136/gpsych-2023-101201 |
| Publisher version: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/gpsych-2023-101201 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported (CC BY 4.0) license, which permits others to copy, redistribute, remix, transform and build upon this work for any purpose, provided the original work is properly cited, a link to the licence is given, and indication of whether changes were made. See: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > Division of Psychiatry UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > Division of Psychiatry > Epidemiology and Applied Clinical Research |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10186907 |
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