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. 2024 May 30;14(6):465.
doi: 10.3390/bs14060465.

Association between COVID-19 and the Risk of Vascular Dementia: A Mendelian Randomisation Study of the Potential Cognitive Sequela of COVID-19

Qing Han  1 , Yue Ma  2   3 , Wenting Ye  4
Affiliations

Association between COVID-19 and the Risk of Vascular Dementia: A Mendelian Randomisation Study of the Potential Cognitive Sequela of COVID-19

Qing Han et al. Behav Sci (Basel). .

Abstract

A growing body of observational studies and Mendelian Randomisation analyses suggest an increased risk of Alzheimer's disease and dementia following COVID-19 infection. However, evidence on the potential association between COVID-19 and vascular dementia, which is plausible given the vascular complications of COVID-19 infection, is still limited. In this study, we conducted a two-sample Mendelian Randomisation analysis to examine the potential causal relationship between COVID-19 phenotypes and the risk of vascular dementia, using summary data from large-scale GWASs. The two-sample Mendelian Randomisation analysis did not detect any significant associations of COVID-19 infection, COVID-19 hospitalisation, or critical COVID-19 with the risk of vascular dementia, with weighted average β values of -0.29 (95% CI: -0.84, 0.26; p = 0.301), -0.12 (95% CI: -0.36, 0.13; p = 0.345), and -0.07 (95% CI: -0.23, 0.09; p = 0.374), respectively. Our findings do not support the hypothesis that vascular dementia is one of the long-term sequelae of COVID-19.

Keywords: COVID-19; Mendelian Randomisation; cognition; vascular dementia.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Study flow chart of data collection and preparation for the two-sample Mendelian Randomisation analysis on COVID-19 and the risk of vascular dementia. Note: SNP = single-nucleotide polymorphisms; GWAS = genome-wide association study.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Graphical illustration of the two-sample Mendelian Randomisation analysis. Note: SNP = single-nucleotide polymorphisms; GWAS = genome-wide association study. “?” refers to the associations to be assessed.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Forest plot of the MR estimates of the association between COVID-19 infection and the risk of vascular dementia. Note: The black dots and lines refer to the estimates and 95% confidence intervals based on individual SNPs; the red dots and lines refer to the pooled estimates and 95% confidence intervals.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Forest plot of the MR estimates of the association between COVID-19 hospitalisation and the risk of vascular dementia. Note: The black dots and lines refer to the estimates and 95% confidence intervals based on individual SNPs; the red dots and lines refer to the pooled estimates and 95% confidence intervals.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Forest plot of the MR estimates of the association between critical COVID-19 and the risk of vascular dementia. Note: The black dots and lines refer to the estimates and 95% confidence intervals based on individual SNPs; the red dots and lines refer to the pooled estimates and 95% confidence intervals.
Figure 6
Figure 6
Scatter plots of the MR estimates between COVID-19 infection (a), COVID-19 hospitalisation (b), and critical COVID-19 (c) and the risk of vascular dementia. Note: The light blue and dark blue lines are overlapped due to identical estimates from the inverse variance weighted method and the maximum likelihood method.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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