No evidence that genetic liability to allergic rhinitis influences systolic blood pressure
MONDAY, June 29, 2026 (HealthDay News) — Genetically predicted lower systolic blood pressure (SBP) seems to increase susceptibility to allergic rhinitis (AR), according to a study published online May 29 in Tobacco Induced Diseases.
Zhu Mao, from Fujian Children”s Hospital in Fuzhou, China, and colleagues examined the impact of SBP on AR risk using a bidirectional two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) framework. Instrumental variables were single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) associated with SBP as exposure at genome-wide significance and exhibiting low linkage disequilibrium.
The forward MR analysis included 421 independent SNPs associated with SBP. The researchers found that genetically lower SBP was associated with an increased risk of AR using the inverse-variance weighted method, weighted median estimator, and MR Egger regression (odds ratios [95 percent confidence intervals], 0.9997 [0.9995 to 0.9999], 0.9998 [0.9995 to 1.0001], and 0.9996 [0.9990 to 1.0001], respectively). There was no evidence that genetic liability influences SBP in reverse MR analysis.
“These findings highlight the intricate interplay between immune regulation and cardiovascular physiology and underscore the need for further mechanistic and clinical investigations,” the authors write.
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