Bidirectional Association between Major Depressive Disorder and Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease: Mendelian Randomization Study

Background: Observational research has found a bidirectional relationship between major depressive disorder and gastroesophageal reflux disease; however, the causal association of this relationship is undetermined. Aims: A bidirectional Mendelian randomization study was performed to explore the causal relationships between major depressive disorder and gastroesophageal reflux disease. Methods: For the instrumental variables of major depressive disorder and gastroesophageal reflux disease, 31 and 24 single-nucleotide polymorphisms without linkage disequilibrium (r2 ≤ 0.001) were selected from relevant genome-wide association studies, respectively, at the genome-wide significance level (p ≤ 5 × 10−8). We sorted summary-level genetic data for major depressive disorder, gastroesophageal reflux disease, gastroesophageal reflux disease without esophagitis, and reflux esophagitis from meta-analysis study of genome-wide association studies involving 173,005 individuals (59,851 cases and 113,154 non-cases), 385,276 individuals (80,265 cases and 305,011 non-cases), 463,010 individuals (4360 cases and 458,650 non-cases), and 383,916 individuals (12,567 cases and 371,349 non-cases), respectively. Results: Genetic liability to major depressive disorder was positively associated with gastroesophageal reflux disease and its subtypes. Per one-unit increase in log-transformed odds ratio of major depressive disorder, the odds ratio was 1.31 (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.19–1.43; p = 1.64 × 10−8) for gastroesophageal reflux disease, 1.51 (95% CI, 1.15–1.98; p = 0.003) for gastroesophageal reflux disease without esophagitis, and 1.21 (95% CI, 1.05–1.40; p = 0.010) for reflux esophagitis. Reverse-direction analysis suggested that genetic liability to gastroesophageal reflux disease was causally related to increasing risk of major depressive disorder. Per one-unit increase in log-transformed odds ratio of gastroesophageal reflux disease, the odds ratio of major depressive disorder was 1.28 (95% confidence interval, 1.11–1.47; p = 1.0 × 10−3). Conclusions: This Mendelian randomization study suggests a bidirectional causal relationship between major depressive disorder and gastroesophageal reflux disease.