Immunogenetics: Open Access
Open Access

Abstract

Multiple Sclerosis and Health Outcomes: A Comprehensive Analysis Based on Observational Meta-Analyses

Lianli Shen, Fang Long, Lixian Zhong, Sisi Chen, Lichen Li and Shaohui Tang*

Purpose: The previous meta-analyses have illustrated that Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is correlated with multiple health outcomes. We designed an umbrella meta-analysis to evaluate the breadth, validity and presence of biases of the associations of MS with diverse health outcomes.

Methods: We searched three databases (PubMed, Web of Science and Embase) to recalculate the summary effect sizes, 95% CI, heterogeneity and small-study effects in the included meta-analyses. For each meta-analysis, we assessed the quality with AMSTAR2 and graded the epidemiologic evidence.

Results: A total of 28 articles comprising 84 unique meta-analyses were included in this study. Among the 84 unique outcomes, 52 unique outcomes had significant associations (p<0.05). Only 6 outcomes (Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD), Ulcerative Colitis (UC), Crohn’s Disease (CD), atrial fibrillation, herpes simplex virus type 2-IgG, hypothyroidism) showed high quality of epidemiological evidence. The remaining 46 outcomes were assessed to moderate or weak quality of evidence.

Conclusion: In our study, MS seems to increase the risk of IBD, UC, CD, herpes simplex virus type 2-IgG and hypothyroidism while decrease the risk of atrial fibrillation, with high epidemiological evidence. In order to verify our results, more prospective observational studies are needed.

Published Date: 2024-04-30; Received Date: 2023-04-05