Type 2 diabetes is a common disease which is linked with multiple health conditions including obesity, high blood pressure, liver disease and heart disease. We know that these diseases can occur when people follow unhealthy diets and have low physical activity levels, but there are also some genetic factors involved. By using UK Biobank data, this project aims to assess to what extent these genetic factors can improve or worsen the effect of unhealthy lifestyle choices.
This will be achieved by creating a lifestyle score from exercise, diet, smoking and sleep data stored on the UK Biobank, as well as genetic score that has been established by our colleagues already. We will then assess imaging data (of the liver, heart, brain and fat levels), blood markers of health, genetic sequencing and diagnoses from the UK Biobank at baseline. The participants identified will be followed up over time to assess whether they develop any new diseases. This may help us identify whether certain people are more at risk of diseases such as type 2 diabetes if they don’t follow healthy lifestyle choices as they have inherited unfavourable genes. Overall, this study is vital as there is currently no large-scale data assessing the interaction between genetic risk and lifestyle choices on diseases such as type 2 diabetes, liver disease and heart disease.
This project will last from December 2023 until ~ December 2026.
This project has considerable potential to improve prevention and early treatment of diseases such as type 2 diabetes, liver disease and heart disease. This will allow for updated public health strategies in the prevention of these diseases. For instance, if we find that an unfavourable genetic score worsens the effect of unhealthy lifestyle choices, this may help to implement strategies to include genetic testing to identify patients most susceptible to disease so that they can be treated early and effectively.