A Missense Variant in COMT Associated with Hearing Loss among Young Adults: The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health)

Citation

Li, C. M.; Chen, L.; Chen, G.; Zhang, J.; & Hoffman, H. J. (2022). A Missense Variant in COMT Associated with Hearing Loss among Young Adults: The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health). Biomedicines. vol. 10 (11)

Abstract

Hearing loss is a major public problem with a heritability of up to 70%. Catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) encodes an enzyme that is highly expressed in sensory hair cells of the inner ear. The association between COMT and hearing loss has not been reported previously in nationally representative population-based studies. A regression linear model was used to estimate associations between the allele/genotype of COMT and self-reported hearing loss based on 13,403 individuals from Wave IV of the Add Health study, a nationally representative sample of multiethnic U.S. young adults. The inverse variance-weighted effect magnitude was estimated using a genetic meta-analysis model. The "A" allele frequency of rs6480 (a missense variant in COMT) was 0.44. The prevalence of hearing loss was 7.9% for individuals with the "A" allele and 6.5% for those with the "G" allele. The "A" allele was significantly associated with increased hearing loss (p = 0.01). The prevalence of hearing loss was 6.0%, 7.2%, and 8.7% for individuals with GG, AG, and AA genotypes, respectively, which was consistent with a genetic additive model. The genotypic association model showed that rs4680 was significantly associated with increased hearing loss (p = 0.006). A missense variant of rs4680 in COMT was significantly associated with increased hearing loss among young adults in a multi-racial/ethnic U.S. population-based cohort.

URL

https://doi.org/10.3390/biomedicines10112756

Keyword(s)

add health

Notes

Li, Chuan-Ming

Reference Type

Journal Article

Journal Title

Biomedicines

Author(s)

Li, C. M.
Chen, L.
Chen, G.
Zhang, J.
Hoffman, H. J.

Year Published

2022

Volume Number

10

Issue Number

11

Edition

2022/11/12

ISSN/ISBN

2227-9059 (Print)

DOI

10.3390/biomedicines10112756

Reference ID

9823