The causal relationships between gut microbiota and venous thromboembolism: a Mendelian randomization study

Venous thromboembolism (VTE) is still one of the most severe health issues, increasing mortality and lengthening hospital stays. Different abundances of gut microbiota have been clinically linked to VTE and coagulopathy. However, whether gut microbiota affected VTE formation remained uncertain.

The causative links between VTE and 211 gut microbiota at phylum, class, order, family and genus level were separately investigated using two-sample Mendelian Randomization (MR) analysis. Firstly, single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) locus-wide significantly (P < 1.0 × 10^- 5) related with gut microbiome abundance were extracted from large genome-wide analysis (GWAS) meta-analysis summary data. Instrumental variables (IVs) without pleiotropy were selected using the PhenoScanner and MR PRESSO test. Then, the MR analysis was implemented using the inverse variance weighted (IVW) method. Moreover, weighted median method, MR Egger method, simple median method and MR PRESSO were conducted to validate the causal associations. The reliability of the results was also assessed utilizing various sensitivity analyses, reverse MR analysis and multivariate Mendelian Randomization analysis (MVMR).

We found the phylum Firmicutes was robustly protective against VTE with MR analysis. Moreover, five taxa of Actinobacteria phylum (Bifidobacteriales order, Actinomycetales order, Bifidobacteriaceae family, Actinomycetaceae family, Slackia genus) and two taxa of Firmicutes phylum (Bacillales order, Lachnospiraceae UCG-010 genus) were suggestively protective for VTE. While three taxa of Firmicutes phylum (Bacilli class, Lactobacillales order and Lactococcus genus) might suggestively increase the risk of VTE. Sensitivity analyses indicated no significant horizontal pleiotropy, heterogeneity, or reverse causal associations. Furthermore, MVMR analysis unveiled independently positive causal association of Firmicutes phylum and Lachnospiraceae UCG-010 genus with risk of VTE.

Two taxa of gut microbes (Firmicutes phylum and Lachnospiraceae UCG-010 genus) were independently protective against VTE, which suggests a potential avenue for developing new cost-effective strategies with minor side effects for VTE prevention and treatment.