Irritable bowel syndrome may share a more similar genetic basis with psychiatric disorders than with gastrointestinal ones, according to new research.
The investigators said these connections reinforce the disease’s standing as a disorder of gut–brain interaction and that their research could aid providers in more fully understanding disease phenotypes and potential treatment targets.
The researchers used statistics from a recent genome-wide association study that included 53,400 cases and 433,201 controls, as well as psychiatric and GI phenotypes, to identify shared loci (Genome Med 2023;15[1]:60). The genetic architecture of IBS shows “a high degree of polygenicity” with 12,000 common variants, according to the research. Genetic overlap identified 132 genomic risk loci for IBS, including 116 that were novel, and 70 loci shared between IBS and psychiatric disorders.
The researchers found that 98% of trait-influencing variants for bipolar disorder and 93% for schizophrenia overlap with IBS. More than half of overlapping variants between IBS and bipolar disorder (55%) and schizophrenia (56%) share a concordant effect (the same phenotype trait).