Mendelian randomization study indicates lack of causal associations between iron status and lung cancer

Observational studies provided conflicting results on the association between iron status and the risk of lung cancer. The aim of our study was to investigate the effect of genetically determined iron status on lung cancer risk using a mendelian randomization (MR) approach. Single-nucleotide polymorphisms for iron status were selected from a genome-wide meta-analysis of 48,972 subjects. Genetic association estimates for risk of lung cancer were derived from a Genome-Wide Association Study (GWAS) summary performed by the International Lung Cancer Consortium. The inverse-variance weighted method was used for the main analyses and sensitivity analyses. MR analysis demonstrated that increased genetically-predicted iron status did not causally increase risk of lung cancer. The odds ratios were 1.11 (95% CI, 0.92, 1.34; P = .26), 0.76 (95% CI, 0.52, 1.12; P = .17), 1.09 (95% CI, 0.86, 1.38; P = .47), and 0.91 (95% CI, 0.81, 1.02; P = .11) per 1 standard deviation increment of serum iron, ferritin, transferrin saturation, and transferrin levels, respectively. No observed indication of heterogeneity (P for Q > 0.05) or pleiotropy (P for intercept > 0.05) were found from the sensitivity analysis. The MR study indicated that genetic iron status was not causally associated with the risk of lung cancer, the causal relationship between iron status and lung cancer needs to be further elucidated by additional studies that strictly control for confounding factors.