International Stroke Conference 2025  /  Risk Factors and Prevention Posters I  /  Infection and adult ischemic stroke: a polygenic risk score analysis
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American Heart Association

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Final ID: WP274

Infection and adult ischemic stroke: a polygenic risk score analysis

Abstract Body: Objective. To evaluate whether genetic overlap exists between infection and adult ischemic stroke (IS).

Background. Infection has long been recognized as a risk factor for stroke, but the underlying mechanism remains unknown and little work has been done to investigate the genetic underpinnings of this relationship.

Design/Methods. We analyzed associations between adult IS and a polygenic risk score (PRS) for childhood ear infections using 6,728 cases from the Early Onset Stroke Consortium and 9,272 cases from the Stroke Genetics Network, for a combined sample size of 16,000 cases and 33,774 controls. This infection type was selected because it showed the greatest number of genome-wide significant associations out of the 32 common infections examined in a previously published GWAS. We then investigated whether this PRS was more strongly associated with cases who had a recent infection. Using data from the Early Onset Stroke study, we compared the association of the PRS between 33 cases with a history of infection in the 2 weeks preceding IS and 357 cases without a preceding infection.

Results. PRS for childhood ear infections was significantly associated with IS (odds ratio 1.028, P=0.0055). PRS for childhood ear infections showed a stronger association with IS in cases who had a preceding infection (odds ratio 1.482, P=0.024) compared to cases without a preceding infection (odds ratio=1.027, P=0.619) (P for interaction=0.049).

Conclusion. The novel finding of our study is the existence of genetic overlap between childhood ear infections and adult IS and that this genetic overlap is stronger in cases with a recent infection. This suggests that the association between the PRS for childhood infection and adult IS is mediated by an increased risk of adult infection. Our study was limited in its sample size to evaluate for IS subtypes. Continued investigation of the potential mechanisms of the infection-stroke relationship is warranted.

Study Supported By: U18NS115388, R01NS100178, and R01NS105150.

Disclosures: None.
  • Morath, Hope  ( University of Maryland School of Medicine , Baltimore , Maryland , United States )
  • Gaynor, Brady  ( University of Maryland School of Medicine , Baltimore , Maryland , United States )
  • Fullerton, Heather  ( UNIV CALIFORNIA SAN FRAN , San Francisco , California , United States )
  • Mitchell, Braxton  ( University of Maryland School of Medicine , Baltimore , Maryland , United States )
  • Kittner, Steven  ( University of Maryland School of Medicine , Baltimore , Maryland , United States )
    • Author Disclosures:
    Hope Morath: DO NOT have relevant financial relationships | Brady Gaynor: DO NOT have relevant financial relationships | Heather Fullerton: DO have relevant financial relationships ; Advisor:Bayer:Active (exists now) | Braxton Mitchell: DO NOT have relevant financial relationships | Steven Kittner: DO NOT have relevant financial relationships
Meeting Info:

International Stroke Conference 2025

2025

Los Angeles, CA

Session Info:

Risk Factors and Prevention Posters I

Wednesday, 02/05/2025 , 07:00PM - 07:30PM

Poster Abstract Session

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