Abstract
Background: Cardio-metabolic disorders (CMD) in grandfathers have been reported to be a risk factor for asthma in their grandchildren. No study has yet replicated this finding.
Objective: To investigate the association of CMD in grandparents and parents and asthma in offspring.
Methods: We studied asthma phenotypes across three generations using data from the third follow-up of the ECRHS study, performed in 2010-2012 in 26 centres across Europe. Through a structured interview 5153 participants answered questions about respiratory disease and CMD (hypertension, heart disease, stroke, diabetes and obesity) as well as questions about their parents and children (n=11,145).
Factors influencing children asthma were examined in multivariate logistic regression models with family nested into centre as random intercept and adjusted for grandparents and parent asthma and other potential confounders.
Results: Grandfather's CMD was associated with offspring asthma (OR=1.6, 1.2-2.1); and this was stronger among male offspring (p-interaction=0.09). The effect was stronger for asthma combined with hay fever, than for asthma alone. When cardio-metabolic factors were analysed separately, significant associations were observed for grandfathers' hypertension and heart disease, while obesity did not show consistent results. No effect of grandmother or parental CMD on offspring asthma was observed.
Conclusion: These preliminary results are similar to those observed previously in Northern-Europe. Grand-father CMD was associated with subsequent asthma in offspring independently of a family history of asthma. This may have important implications with regard to public health intervention.
- Copyright ©the authors 2016
