Abstract
Obesity is a well-known risk factor for multiple diseases including multiple sclerosis (MS). Polymorphisms in the fat-mass obesity (FTO) gene have been consistently found to be associated with obesity, and recently found to increase the risk of developing MS. We therefore assessed the common FTO gene polymorphism (rs9939609) in relation to obesity, risk of developing MS and its disability in a cohort of MS patients. A cohort of 200 MS patients (135 females and 65 males) were genotyped for the FTO rs9939609 polymorphism. Using both logistic and linear regression we assessed the relationship between the variant and the selected phenotypes under both an additive and recessive genetic models. The A-allele was found to be associated with being overweight/obese in MS patients (OR = 2.48 (95% CI 1.17–5.29); p = 0.01). In addition, The A-allele was also found to be associated with increased MS disability (β = 0.48 (95% CI 0.03–0.92); p = 0.03). However, no association was found with risk of developing MS (p > 0.05). Moreover, our association with obesity is consistent with previous reports, whereas the association with disability is novel and warrants further investigation on the role of FTO in disease progression.
Highlights
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic demyelinating autoimmune disorder of the central nervous system with over 2.2 million people affected worldwide[1]
We assessed the relationship between the common fat-mass obesity (FTO) gene polymorphism and obesity status in multiple sclerosis (MS) patients after adjusting for both age and gender (Table 3)
Using a recessive genetic model a significant difference (p = 0.01) was observed in the distribution of the AA genotype in the overweight/obese group compared to the BMI normal group, 29.9% compared to 14.5% respectively (Table 3)
Summary
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic demyelinating autoimmune disorder of the central nervous system with over 2.2 million people affected worldwide[1]. Obesity is an environmental risk factor for multiple diseases including MS6–8. These studies have been conducted on both children and adults and have shown a 2-fold increase in the development of MS in obese (Body mass index (BMI) > 30 kg/m2) subjects compared to subjects with BMI between 18.5–21 kg/m2 9. The prevalence of obesity has tripled in the past 30 years and it is estimated to be 50% in the Kuwaiti population[16] Both genetic and environmental factors contribute to the development of obesity[17]. FTO genetic variants and altered expression have been reported to associate with several obesity-related chronic diseases such as type-2-diabetes[28] and cancer[29]. In this study we were interested in assessing the relationship between the common FTO gene polymorphism (rs9939609) with obesity, MS risk and disability in a cohort of MS patients
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