Objective: This study examined the association between blood triglyceride (TG) levels (TLIB) and age spots (AS).
Methods: We acquired data from the Mendelian randomization (MR) Base database and evaluated the causal association between TLIB and AS.
Results: From genome-wide association studies, we selected 33 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) that were significantly associated with TLIB and AS. The inverse variance-weighted (IVW) and weighted median estimation methods showed that TLIB had a protective effect on AS (IVW: β=− 0.214, P =0.019, odds ratio [OR]=0.807, 95% confidence interval [CI]=0.674– 0.966; weighted median: β=− 0.277, P =0.032, OR=0.758, 95% CI=0.589– 0.977). However, the MR‐Egger analysis suggested no causal association (β=− 0.234, P =0.085, OR=0.792, 95% CI=0.612– 1.024). The greater precision of the weighted median estimation and IVW suggests that our results support a potential causal association between TLIB and AS.
Conclusion: The MR analysis proved that TLIB has a protective effect against AS and that triglycerides have potential preventive and therapeutic effects against AS. However, the specific dose-effect relationship requires further study.
Keywords: age spots, triglycerides, Mendelian randomization