Genetic associations with brain microbleeds
- 12 July 2011
- journal article
- review article
- Published by Ovid Technologies (Wolters Kluwer Health) in Neurology
- Vol. 77 (2), 158-167
- https://doi.org/10.1212/wnl.0b013e318224afa3
Abstract
Objective: We performed a systematic review and meta-analyses to assess the evidence for genetic associations with brain microbleeds (BMBs). Methods: We sought all published studies of the association between any genetic polymorphism and BMBs studied in a total of >100 people. We critically appraised studies, and calculated pooled odds ratios (ORs) using the generic inverse variance fixed effects method. We used I2 and χ2 statistics to assess heterogeneity, and fail-safe N estimates to assess the robustness of our results. Results: Only the APOE ϵ2/3/4 polymorphism had been studied in >100 people (10 studies, 7,351 participants). Compared with people with the ϵ3/ϵ3 genotype, carriers of the ϵ4 allele (ϵ4+) were statistically significantly more likely to have BMBs in any location (ϵ4+ vs ϵ3/ϵ3: pooled OR 1.22, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.05–1.41, p = 0.01). For strictly lobar BMBs, this association appeared slightly stronger (ϵ4+ vs ϵ3/ϵ3: pooled OR 1.35, 95% CI 1.10–1.66, p = 0.005). The association of ϵ4+ genotypes with strictly lobar BMBs was reasonably robust to potential publication and reporting biases. Conclusions: Given the known associations of APOE alleles with lobar intracerebral hemorrhage and cerebral amyloid angiopathy, these findings support the concept that strictly lobar BMBs may be an imaging biomarker of cerebral amyloid angiopathy.This publication has 33 references indexed in Scilit:
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