Study: genetics and Type 1 diabetes

MaryPat
Wed, 04 Oct 2017 01:42:50 +0000
T1 Research

The Trialnet study, which many of us with T1 children are familiar with, has been generating some interesting data on genetics. Their most recent statistical analysis had some interesting conclusions:

Type 1 and LADA appear to be different diseases, since they are associated with different distributions of alleles:

"This is clear evidence that type 1 diabetes after 30 years is not just a delayed version of type 1 diabetes before 30. "

The authors were able to come up with a genetic metric, the GRS, that was strongly predictive of the development of diabetes:

“Participants with GRS cutoffs of less than 0.25 had a 74% likelihood of not developing T1D within 5 years, vs a 56% chance among those with GRS scores of 0.25 or above (hazard ratio, 0.57; P = .0012).”

There is another metric, the DPTRS (which is not purely genetic but also looks at other factors). Those with a DPTRS score of 7 or more are highly likely to develop diabetes:

“those with scores above 7 are already highly likely to develop type 1 diabetes (70% at 5 years, 93% at 10 years).”

We have recently argued about genetics and environment in T1D. The fact that these metrics are so predictive makes me believe that there is little environmental and much that is genetic in Type 1 Diabetes.

The new study can be found here:

http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/886458#vp_1

6 posts - 6 participants