Evidence map›Paper›PMID 34008876›Full record

ArticleGenetic epidemiology2021

Caution against examining the role of reverse causality in Mendelian Randomization.

Sharon M Lutz, Ann Chen Wu, John E Hokanson, Stijn Vansteelandt, Christoph Lange

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Genetic epidemiology, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
21citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

21 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Article
  2. Circulating proteomic landscape of lung function.The European respiratory journal · 2026
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4 · The record

Corrections and comments

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Sharon M LutzDepartment of Population Medicine, PRecisiOn Medicine Translational Research (PROMoTeR) Center, Harvard Medical School and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.ORCID 0000-0002-1515-9431
Ann Chen WuDepartment of Population Medicine, PRecisiOn Medicine Translational Research (PROMoTeR) Center, Harvard Medical School and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
John E HokansonDepartment of Epidemiology, Anschutz Medical Campus, University of Colorado, Aurora, Colorado, USA.
Stijn VansteelandtDepartment of Applied Mathematics, Computer Science, and Statistics, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.
Christoph LangeDepartment of Biostatistics, Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.

Funding

Genetic Epidemiology of COPDU01HL089897 · NHLBI · NATIONAL JEWISH HEALTH · PI CRAPO, JAMES D · 2007 to 2021
$56.9M
Genetic Epidemiology of COPDU01HL089856 · NHLBI · BRIGHAM AND WOMEN'S HOSPITAL · PI SILVERMAN, EDWIN K · 2007 to 2021
$20.7M
Age-Dependent Pharmacogenomics of Asthma Treatment (ADAPT)R01HD085993 · NICHD · HARVARD PILGRIM HEALTH CARE, INC. · PI WU, ANN CHEN · 2016 to 2020
$3.1M
Common Genetic Pathways Underlying CVD and COPDK01HL125858 · NHLBI · UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO DENVER · PI LUTZ, SHARON MARIE · 2015 to 2019
$721k
NHLBI NIH HHS K01 HL125858NHLBI NIH HHS U01 HL089856NHLBI NIH HHS U01 HL089897NICHD NIH HHS R01 HD085993
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Recently, Mendelian Randomization (MR) has gained in popularity as a concept to assess the causal relationship between phenotypes in genetic association studies. An extension of standard MR methodology, the MR Steiger approach, has recently been developed to infer the causal direction between two phenotypes in prospective studies. Through simulation studies, we examined and quantified the ability of the MR Steiger approach to determine the causal direction between two phenotypes (i.e., effect direction). Through simulation studies, our results show that the MR Steiger approach may fail to correctly identify the direction of causality. This is true, especially in the presence of pleiotropy. We also applied the MR Steiger method to the COPDGene study, a case-control study of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in current and former smokers, to examine the role of smoking on lung function. We have created an R package on Github called reverseDirection which runs simulations for user-specified scenarios to examine when the MR Steiger approach can correctly determine the causal direction between two phenotypes in any user specified scenario. In summary, our results emphasize the importance of caution when the MR Steiger approach is used in to infer the direction of causality.

Indexed as

Mendelian Randomization AnalysisModels, GeneticCase-Control StudiesCausalityHumansProspective Studiescausal directionMendelian Randomizationreverse causality

Identifiers

PMID34008876
PMCPMC8222166

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.