MS Risk and Age at Puberty: What’s the Connection?

Children who experience puberty at a later age may be less likely to develop multiple sclerosis (MS) in adulthood, according to a new study.

To assess the relationship between age at puberty onset and MS susceptibility, the researchers used 372 genetic variants strongly associated with age at menarche in a genome-wide association study that involved 329,245 women participants. 

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The effect that age at time of puberty has on MS risk was measured with summary statistics from a genome-wide association study of 14,802 patients with MS and 26,703 controls from the International Multiple Sclerosis Genetics Consortium. 

According to the researchers, because the genetic architecture of pubertal timing is similar in boys and girls, their study can be extrapolated to boys, as well.

The researchers determined that an individual’s likelihood of developing MS decreases by 8% if she or he had a 1-year increase in genetically predicted age at puberty. 

The researchers also evaluated whether body mass index (BMI) had an effect on the association between age at puberty and risk for MS. And after accounting for effects on adult BMI, the association attenuated; accounting for BMI in childhood had similar results. 

“We found support for an association between higher age at puberty and decreased risk for MS with a magnitude comparable to that reported in observational studies,” the researchers concluded. “This effect appears to be largely mediated by the strong association between age at puberty and obesity. A large causal effect of pubertal timing independent of BMI is unlikely.”

—Colleen Murphy

Reference:

Harroud A, Morris JA, Forgetta V, et al. Effect of age at puberty on risk of multiple sclerosis: a mendelian randomization study. Neurology. 2019;92(16):e1803-e1810. https://doi.org/10.1212/WNL.0000000000007325.