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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Nutr.
Sec. Nutritional Epidemiology
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fnut.2024.1426779
This article is part of the Research Topic Optimizing Hydration: Advances in Understanding, Assessment, and Promotion View all 3 articles

Causal relationship between green tea intake and gastrointestinal disorders: a two-sample Mendelian randomization study

Provisionally accepted
Chan Chen Chan Chen 1Yifei Lin Yifei Lin 2Jinni Xu Jinni Xu 2Qingquan Chen Qingquan Chen 2Jing Huang Jing Huang 1*
  • 1 Fujian Vocational College of Agriculture, Fuzhou, China
  • 2 Fujian Medical University, Fuzhou, Fujian Province, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    The precise association between green tea intake and gastrointestinal disorders remains controversial. This study aimed to investigate the potential causal association bewteen green tea intake and gastrointestinal disorders through a two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) study. Methods: Utilizing publicly accessible data from genome-wide association studies (GWAS), we identified SNPs strongly linked with the study variables from multiple large databases to serve as instrumental variables (IVs). MR analyses were executed utilizing the inverse variance weighting (IVW) method, with the resultant effect estimates serving as the primary outcome measure. In addition, a multivariate MR design was performed to adjust for smoking and alcohol consumption. To ensure the robustness of our findings, a series of sensitivity analyses were conducted to assess reliability. Results:Univariable MR analysis revealed suggestive associations between green tea intake and gastroesophageal reflux (OR = 0.9950, 95%CI 0.9900-1.0000, PIVW = 0.047), diverticulosis (OR = 0.9998, 95%CI 0.9996-1.0000, PIVW = 0.030), Crohn's disease (OR = 1.0001, 95%CI 1.0000-1.0002, PIVW = 0.019), and cholangitis was observed(OR = 1.0440, 95%CI 1.0100-1.0790, PIVW = 0.011). Multivariate MR analysis indicated after controlling for potential confounders, greater green tea consumption was suggestively associated with the decreased risk of oesophagitis (OR = 0.9667, 95% Cl: 0.9405-0.9936, PIVW = 0.016) and gastric cancer (OR = 0.9810, 95% Cl: 0.9628-0.9996, PIVW = 0.046). Nevertheless, multivariate MR analysis also showed that greater green tea consumption was suggestively associated with the increased risk of Crohn's disease (OR = 1.0001, 95% Cl: 1.0000-1.0002, PIVW = 0.007). Sensitivity analyses confirmed that these results were reliable.Our study provides suggestive evidence that genetically predicted green tea intake is causally associated with the risk of oesophagitis, gastric cancer and Crohn's disease, but a larger GWAS database is needed for validation.

    Keywords: green tea intake, Mendelian randomization, gastrointestinal disorders, association study, causal relationship

    Received: 02 May 2024; Accepted: 10 Sep 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Chen, Lin, Xu, Chen and Huang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Jing Huang, Fujian Vocational College of Agriculture, Fuzhou, China

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