Posts Tagged ‘mendelian randomization’

Observational studies have suggested for some time that obesity might raise the risk of dementia for a person with obesity. But observational studies have limitations. They can suggest a hypothesis. Not prove causality. So the news of evidence from a Mendelian randomization study that obesity can cause vascular dementia is important. Methods and Findings This […]

A new Mendelian randomization study brings a disciplined look at the question of why social and economic status correlates with lifespan. Such questions are hard to answer with certainty, so this new publication in Nature Human Behavior is quite welcome. Chao-Jie Ye and colleagues found a causal association between education and longevity in populations of […]

“Coffee could slash obesity,” says the New York Post. Now you might think that cynical folks at the Post just make this stuff up because it’s so obviously false. But in fact, they have help from PR by the BMJ, and they’re not alone. The BMJ managed to induce quite a few news outlets last […]

Causality in the relationship between obesity and depression is mighty hard to discern in a rigorous way. For clinicians, it seems obvious that obesity creates a risk for depression. Likewise, the observation that depression in some patients can lead to obesity is easy to find. But understanding that causal relationship is a challenge. Mere association […]

We are pretty much done with the label of healthy obesity, because it is a perfect oxymoron. If a pattern of adiposity is healthy, then it’s not obesity. But newly published in eLife is a more thoughtful approach to this subject. This study seeks to untangle the metabolic effects of higher adiposity from other effects […]